
1)0(1 



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PRESENTICD \^ 



Correspondence of 

Thomas Ebenezer Thomas 



MAINLY RELATING TO THE 

ANTI-SLAVERY CONFLICT IN OHIO, 

ESPECIALLY IN THE 

' PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH. 




PUBLISHED BY HIS SON. 



1909 



"The truth, which in our case, has been the suffering truth, has 
certain paramount rights ; among these, the right to assert itself 
to be the truth, and to have always been the truth." 

—E. D. Mac Master. 



"The true lite of a man is in his letters. 
.... Not only for the interest of a biogra- 
phy, hut for arriving at the inside of things, 
the piihlication of letters is the true method. 
Biographers varnish, they assign motives, they 
conjecture feelings, they interpret Lord Bur- 
leigh's nods; hut contemporary letters are 

facts."— 1>^. Newman to his sister. May 18, 1863. 



The notes in this volume, mostly biographical, are written 
by Alfred A. Thomas. 

Qiffe 

!3 Jfr'09 






PREFACE. 

The reason why these pages are now put in print appears below : 

"Prof. Alfred H. Upham, 

My Dear Sir : 

I recall the meeting of the Dayton Miami Alumni, when you came 
last, and read a few pages of what some one prepared to publish for the 
coming Centennial in June. You should have come first; for we all wished 
to hear what you had no due time to read. I want a copy of the few 
pages you read ; it touches matters that I have long had an interest In. 

I may mail you some information relating to the subject, or print 
and send it to you. 

With much respect, I beg to remain. 

Very truly, 

A. A. Thomas," 

Fjbrimrg 17, 1809 gons 12-17, 1909 

The ClBntennial nf TOiami lUniMBrsitg 

©xfnrri, ©hin 

TlTB gnint CIotnmrttEE on ^rrsngmtsnts, rRKprBSBnting 
Trnstjejs, ^Intnni and ^niw^rsttg FarnltiBS 

QUrmrman, ^. H. ^phatn, ©xforil, ©liiij 
Srcrttarr, 93. S. ^Battlcto, Hamilton, 0hia 



April 22, 1909. 
A. A. Thomas, Esq., 

Dayton, Ohio. 
Dear Sir : 

I send you a copy of the chapter to which you referred so kindly in 
your letter. The entire MSS. of the book is now in the printer's hands, 
and I hope that the completed work will measure up to the idea you have 
formed of this first chapter. 

Very truly yours. 

A. H. Upham." 

The completed publication of the Centennial Committee of Miami 
University I have not seen : all presumptions are In its favor. Most of 
what appears In its Chapter I, on "Pioneer Days,'' is well enough ; but 
through the concluding pages there runs a vein of ridicule ; and they 



present, I submit, no fair picture of tlie character, quality and record of 
tlie first tliree Presidents, and of two of tlie Professors of the first 
twenty-five years of the University's life. 

"At the head of the list stands the souiev.hat rawboned and ungainly 
figure of President Bishoi)." * * * He had many friends, high cheek bones 
and friendly eyes. Both he and President E. D. MacMaster. later, had "the 
mantle of authority stripped from shoulders not yet stooped with age," 
and because they could not m.'untain discipline. * * * Prof. William H. 
Mc(iuffey had "two i)assions which consumed his young life. — the preaching 
of the gospel and the education of the child-mind." He was "a cold, unap- 
proachable man who wanteti his students to drill every morning in public 
oratory at .'):()<) A. M." * * * He wore "a stove pipe hat and a solemn suit 
of shining black bombazine; and the Darrtown congregation that he sup- 
plied, were imi)repsed by the glassy sheen of his garments." 

When Doctor Scott returned from "Carey's premature project of the 
Farmer's College." "Ben Harrison was in his train when Doctor S. 
gatlieretl about them a circle of demure and bewitching maidens." * * * 

"At this time, the extreme abolitionists were lifting up their voices 
throughout the land. A part of them in the Presbyterian church de- 
manded the immediate exclusion of all shive-holding members. Doctor 
Junkin demurred. He was a staunch union man. and personally opposed 
to slavery, but he believed that emancipation should come by slow and 
gradual process, based on a scheme of deportation. In a session of Pres- 
bytery, he expressed himself succinctly in a few well-chosen words re- 
quiring some ten hours in their delivery and at once a new enemy camped 
at his gates. A man who took ten blessed hours to prove that slave-holding 
Southerners would find their names recorded on the Book of Life was 
not tit custodia.n of their childi'en's characters, said the abolitionists. The 
allied opposition was too much for Doctor Junkin and he withdrew." 

"At Miami, Doctor Junkin was succeeded by an ardent abolitionist, 
Erasmus D. MacMaster."* * * "He was a very i)ainful preacher, and 
his ponderous antitheses and periods searched the heart of weighty ques- 
tions as they deliberately rolled from his tongue." * * * * 

Troubles followed. * * * "But now the work was ruined, the student 
body scattered, and the institution crippled. The splendid spirit of Doctor 
MacMaster was broken for the time, and he retired from the University. 
With the brilliant, popular and prosperous administration of President 
Anderson, Miami entered on her second quarter century of active life, 
secure, efficient, optimistic. Pioneering days wei'e done forever." 

I have condensed from various pages, but the reader will have the 
official publication, to test or verify the substantial accuracy of my quo- 
tations. 

"Honor thy father and thy mother that thy days may be long in the 
land which the Lord thy God has given thee." 

That is a commandment to be remembered by more persons than 
escaped Presbyterians like me. On Centennial birthdays, it should be 
remembered by quasi-public corporations for educational purposes. 



Thomas E. Thomas was graduated at ISIiami in the ohiss of 1834, 
after having been there five years. In 1892, his sons prepared for publi- 
cation, with notes written by them, what appears on the title page of this 
volume. It had an introduction by the Rev. S. F. Scovel. D. D., then 
rresident of Wooster University. 

The MSS. was laid aside " for the ninth ripening year :'' then it was 
considered by his sons and grandsons, and the conclusion reached not 
to publish. "Everybody is dead, and the sons and daughters do not 
care for such matters." 

This chapter on "Pioneer Days" made me open and read that box 
of dusty papers. Dr. Thomas's sous have published no book and do not 
know how to edit one. But Doctors Bishop, MacMaster, and Scott, and 
Professor McGuffey too, were my father's friends: I feel I hold a brief to 
their memory, and now is the time to print it. 

Only a third part of these MSS. and letters are here published. The 
reader w^ho cares for Miami only must excuse a somewhat awkward pre- 
sentation of matter prepared for another purpose. Material for an ade- 
quate history of the anti-slavery conflict in the Presbyterian Church, and 
of the early days of Miami University too, still exists in the homes of 
her early graduates : and here is some contribution for the use of whoever 
in the future, will come, able and ready to tell the story. 

The awkwardness above confessed lies in part in inability to exclude 
closely interwoven matter which does not relate to Miami University. 
As I rely also much on the testimony of my father, a few addi- 
tional letters of his are given, of use here only to exhibit his character 
as a witness, and competency to express an opinion. 

The liberty has been taken, also, to add one or two brief letters to 
Dr. Thomas from his mother. Some may think to do so is impertinent; 
that when they see a treetop, they know all about it, regardless of what 
soil its roots run down into. 

These "Notes", written seventeen years ago, in so far as they men- 
tion contemporary living persons, are not up to date. This is necessarily 
so, for my brother, the Rev. John 11. Thomas, is dead, and I am not up 
to date myself. 

I know too little to criticize Miami University during the past twenty 
years ; but enougl^ to believe it is doing creditably a most practical work, 
and in fulfillment of the high aims of its founders. Dr. Benton is a 
worthy successor of Miami's early presidents; and his faculty and helpers 
deserve the respect of all who have inherited a love of ]SIiami. That the 
compiler of this Centennial memorial should fall into some error is the 
fault of those who have withheld data needed to give true lines to the 
picture. Only one side of a contention has been told : it was as if a 
case half argued had gone by defaultr Dr. Jnnkin's biography by his 
brother is the authority generally at hand, and the story of the Seminaries 
by Dr. Halsey, is as fair as possible, when he omits what he wished had 
not been done or said. 

In fact, at an early date, no small group of friends realized the 
consequence of these conditions: they met at Oxford and deputed Dr. 
Thornton A. Mills to give an address on Dr. Bishop, and my father to 



write his biography ; Dr.-¥: did his task well : my father gathered inade- 
quate but salient material : I hold a crumbling memorandum sent him from 
Crawfordsville in 1855, by Rev. John Thomson, founder of Wabash College, 
who gathered with filial hand, in bound pamphlets. Dr. Bishop's many 
publications, during twenty years in Kentucky ; the paper ends thus : 

"May the Lord prosper your endeavors to keep the grace of God shed 
upon that man from being forgotten as if hid under a bushel. 

Your brother in the best of bonds, 

John Thomson. 

P. S. Opportunity to send the books sooner failed ; and I had to wait 
to get some person going that I could tmst. It would cost fifty cents to 
send the books by the cars." 

If one now can read between the lines of these letters, "res angusta 
donii" he will learn in part why the writers did 'not make due publica- 
tion of what they knew justice to their memories might require in years 
to come. 

Alfbed a. Thomas. 
Dayton, Ohio, May 1900. 



In 1892 Dr. S. F. Scovel wrote an introduction for a publi- 
cation of this Correspondence. As over half of the letters are 
not now printed, I take the liberty to append these paragi-aphs 
only, of what he wrot«. 

PART OF INTRODUCTORY NOTE 
BY DR. SCOVEL. 

There are two elements in the book, the biographical and 
tiie autobiographical, the one in the notes and the other in the 
letters. It is high praise to say that the first is worthy of the 
second. Evidently no pains have been spared to bring together 
most valuable information concerning the authors of the corre- 
spondence, and to supply side lights wherever necessary. The 
judgments expressed, for which the author of the notes is re- 
sponsible, are worthy of attention even from those who might be 
inclined to differ here or there. They are, in general, as kindly 
meant as they are decided. The book would be much less useful 
than it promises to be without these addenda. 

1. We need wait no longer for the perspective of time. Nearly 
sixtj' years (1834-93) is time-distance enough. The main results 
are now so plain we cannot mistake the outlines of judgment 
concerning those whose travail of soul had so much to do with 
the latter birth of great events. 

2. The period covered by this correspondence imparts to 
it a unique interest. Earlier the work here related could not 
have been done. Later would have been too late. A little away 
from the actual pioneer work which had either been already 
accomplished or was being carried forward by others, these 
actors were called to the noble task of moulding a sentiment 
which should be able to resist the gathering force of avarice 
stimulated by gain and then re-enforced by fundamental misread 
ing of our national Constitution, and by deplorably mistaken 
exegesis of the Scriptures. 

3. No one can read this volume without being touched 
with what he must read (mainly between the lines and by fewest 
hints) conrcerning the self-denial with which every step of the 
anti-slavery propaganda was accompanied. The money seemed 
all to have a pro-slavery ring about it. Small incomes and young 
families made plain living with this high thinking. But even so, 
generosity and justice went hand in hand. To help students, to 
hold meetings, to print appeals, to sustain journals, to attend 
Conventions — the money to do all these things was found by 
some means or other. And this was done for years and done 
when a far different thing and the more comfortable thing might 
have been done. 

4. Never were better illustrations furnished of the perplex- 
ities of good men as to methods. Common aims do not bring 



always unity as to instrumentalities. In -this correspondence 
emerge the ever-recurring questions of third-party organization, 
of protesting secession from the church, of the minister's rela- 
tion to moral questions in ])olitics, the advisability of special 
organs against the more widely diffused ordinary press, the em- 
ployment of agents and the rank of men who can be persuaded 
to enter upon such work. They seemed to encounter these ditti- 
culties with skill born of sincerity in a common and controlling 
purpose. In the light of subsequent events they seem to have 
decided wisely. They were widely separated (considering the 
circumstances) and yet they wrought efficiently as is proven by 
the substantial unity maintained in their churches. 

5. Nothing is more noticeable than the wise, temperate 
and earnestly religious appeals for action against slavery which 
were put forth during these years. They observed as careful 
a balance in motives as they did in means. They were not Garri- 
sonians, nor unbelievers of any type. They professed and ad- 
vocated only such motives as grew out of love to God and man. 
They refuted the slanders sometimes uttered against the religion 
of Christ, even when they were called to rebuke the fearful 
apostasy of many professed Christians, and the apathy and 
finally the complicity of the larger portion of the Church of 
Christ. 

0. It is interesting to note how they found in the Scrip- 
tures the very help they needed when it seemed the arch-con- 
trivance of the wicked one to wrest this from them. They fed 
their faith on its promises to the poor and oppressed as they 
wrestled against its perversion into a bulwark of oppression. 
They vindicated its teaching and then leaned upon its assur- 
ances. They had that sublime confidence in God, amid unnum- 
bered difficulties and frequent reverses, w^hich showed that they 
"had been with Jesus". They surely had "fainted" except as 
they believed. Dr. Thomas's oft-repeated "The Lord reigneth", 
was earlier than Garfield's utterance in New York after the 
assassination of 1865, "God reigns and the government at Wash- 
ington still lives". 

7. If any say that the little things indicating aroused 
feeling and differing judgment among men now passed on to- 
- gether to the better world, ought not to be pi-eserved in print, 
there is at least this justification — that nothing great will ever 
be accomplished by imperfectly sanctified instrumentalities with- 
out "much disputation". We' are still in the twilight and have 
our work to do under essentially the same conditions as those 
which they knew. We may learn from them on all sides. And, 
surely, the lesson cannot be missed in these records that we are 
to be' tolerant and patient and in honor esteeming others Ijetter 
than ourselves. Sylvester F. Scovel 

Woostcr University, Ohio, 
Decemher 25, 1892. 



To 
THOMAS H. THOMAS. 

If for lack of literary skill, which the writer 
wants in compiling- this volume, his defense of Dr. 
Bishop fails; the grandson of Thomas E. Thomas 
must take the matter up. You have the }>recedent 
for sixty year intervals. But get ready: tell your 
son the duty inheres in our family, and runs by 
primogeniture. I bid him go to the next Ontennary 
at Miami University, and rub off any moss that may 
have gathered over the memory of her first President. 



INTERPOLATION. 

SOMETHING TO REMEMBER AT MIAMI'S CENTENNIAL. 



Dartmouth for years was a measley college. With a motto, 
"Vox elamantis in deserto." it started as a mission school for 
Indians, and failed, as the Oxford students' early mission band 
"failed" when trying to Christianize Indians on the Wabash. 
Indeed, for more than thirty years there was little to it but noble 
effort and small results. Like Miami, it had only land which 
was sold for no price; and had neither dormitories, nor appara- 
tus, nor any library but theological discards from English 
homes. Except for persistency as a fighter, Dr. Bishop was a 
greater man than Dr. Eleazer Wheelock, the first President of 
Dartmouth,— greater in nearly all things that Wheelock was 
good in. Wealth and culture too, avoided Hanover, for the 
coast region where it felt more respectable. Such conditions 
cause a "lack of discipline." The students loaded a 4th of 
July cannon and blew in the chapel door, and were "dissatisfied" 
when fined for repairs. In infancy. Sovereign States have small 
maternal instinct for educational brats, no matter how honor- 
ably begotten. The legislature of New Hampshire took a hand, 
and ousted the corporation with old Wheelock on top of it, and 
put in its own appointees. They said as Matthew Arnold did 
of Lincoln, "He lacked distinction," and took possession of near- 
ly everything except the corporation seal which Wheelock carried 
on his' person. The Supreme Court of the State confirmed the 
ouster. Then old Dr. Wheelock thought of a graduate who was 
poor when the college was poor; but born in a log cabin him- 
self, was not ashamed of the humble conditions of his alma 
mater. This alumnus, not yet much known, took the case. In 
the Supreme Court of the' United States, Daniel Webster in 
great argiiment, wrung from the court a decision that saved the 
college, and has been complained of as a permanent obstruction 
in the jurisprudence of this country. 

The attorneys for the State spoke of Dartmouth as "not 
amounting to much anyhow." Webster closed his peroration 
by resplyi.ng, "They say this is a little college, but there are 
those wiio love it,"— then he could not go on. When he saw the 
kind face of the Chief Justice beaming upon him, he turned and 
added, "and now when she is standing like Caesar in the Senate 
House, and these men reiterating stab upon stab, I would not 
for mv life have her turn to me and exclaim, "Et tu, qiioque, mi 



New Hampshire's lawyers were concerned to notice that John 
Marshall's eyes were misty so he could not read. They after- 
wards complained Webster had "unfairly influenced the court." 
In fact, they were "hoist by their own petard." 

Founded as claimed in 17G9, in the first twenty-five years, 
Dartmouth accomplished far less than Miami did. Doctor 
Eleazer Wheelock is now one of the honored men in New Eng- 
land college annals. His name would never be heard of but 
for one thing. He trained up a student w^ho was able to protect 
him in his need, as Dr. Bishop did not.— A. A. T., May, 1909. 



CHRONOLOGY ANTI-SLAVERY CONTEST. 

183G. Pro-Slavery iiiohs in Cincinnati destroyed James G, Birney's 
presses, and tlireatened him. 

1840. Harrison elected President. 

1845. Annexation of Texas. 

1846-8. War with Mexico. 

1850. Fugitive slave law passed. 

1854. Missouri compromise repealed. 

185G. Fremont nominated for President. 

1857. Dred Scott decision. 

1^7. Lecomptou Constitution adopted; and struggle in Kansas. 

1858. Debates between Lincoln and Douglas. 
18G0. Lincoln nominated. 

18G1. Bombardment of Fort Sumpter. 

180(). Secty. of State Seward, formally announces final extinction of 
slavery in United States. 

In Pvound Numbers. THE LIBERTY-FREE SOII^vote was or became 
as follows : 

1840 Biruey "^.l^O 

1844 Birney 62,300 

f Van Buren » 

1848 300.000 

I Gerrit Smith ) 

1852 John P. Hale 155,900 

1856 Fremont 1,341,000 

1860 Lincoln 1.900,000 



MIAMI UNIVERSITY. 

Dates connected with matters in this correspondence. 

1809. Legislative act establishes Miami University. 

1810. Legislature directed college to be located. 
1817. University organizing and buildings going up. 

1823. Main buildings completed. 

1824. Faculty organized. Prof. Bishop, then Vice-President and Pro- 

fessor of Nat. Philosophy of Transylvania University elected 
President. College opening in November with twenty students. 

1825. President Bishop inaugurated. » 

1826. Wm. H. McGuflfey chosen Professor of Languages, Philosophies, and 

General Criticism. 

1828. John W. Scott elected Professor of Mathematics and Nat. Philoso- 

phy. 

1829. Thos. E. Thomas entered Miami: graduated in class 1834. 

1832. Professoi-s Sam'l W. McCracken and Thomas Armstrong began. 

1836. Professor McGuffey resigned. Succeeding year Samuel Galloway, 
Chauncey N. Olds, tutors. 

1840. Dr. Bishop In the fall removed. Dr. John C. Young of Danville, 

Ky., elected President. Prof. Sc-ott continuing; and Dr. Bishop 
remaining as Professor till '45. 

1841. Dr. Junkin elected and took his chair in April. Dr. Bishop resigned. 
1845. Dr. Junkin resigned. E. D. McMaster elected. 

1849. Dr. McMaster resigned. Dr. Wm. C. Anderson elected. 
1854. Dr. Anderson resigned and Dr. John W. Ilall elected. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 

I'reface and Reasons for Publication. By A. A. Thomas. 

Introduction. By Rev. Sylvester F. Scovil, D. D. 

Injunction to compiler's son and grandson, to defend Dr. Bishop's memory. 

Interpolation. The early years of Dartmouth College and of Miami Uni- 
versity, compared. 

Chronology of Anti-Slavery Contest. 

Miami University. Dates relating to. connected with matters in this Cor- 
respondence. 

CHAPTER I. 

18.34 to 184.5. 

Anti-slavery activities at Miami University that centered in Butler 
County. — Co-operation elsewhere among Ohio Presbyterian ab- 
olitionists, up to displacement of Dr. Bishop at Oxford 1-32 

CHAPTER II. 

1824 to 1849. 

The first three Presidents of Miami TTniversity, Drs. Bishop, Junkin, 
and MacMaster. — Reasons and consequences of the removal of 
President Bis-hop and Professor John W. Scott 33-67 

CHAPTER III. 

1845 to 1850. 

Deliverance in 184.5, by the Presbyterian General Assembly on the 

subject of slavery.— Who brought it about ; and its consequences 08-90 

CHAPTER IV. 

1850 to 1857. 

Drs. MacMaster and Thomas go to the Seminary at New Albany. — 
They cause its removal to Chicago. — Attempt to train ministers 
removed from slave influences 91-104 

CHAPTER V. 

1859 to 1862. 

Great gathering of pro slaverv men at General Assembly at Indian- 
apolis in 1859.— Who was there.— Drs. MacMaster and Thomas 
removed because they would not keep silent on the slavery 

question ^"^" 

CHAPTER VI. 
1862 to 1874. 

In «tre«s of war time,— Dr. MacMaster is restored to his chair in 
\he Theological Seminary.— The story of Cyrus H. MeCormick. 
—Dr. Thomas's failing strength.— Last letters I^z-l6i 



Organization of the first anti-slavery society at Miami. Its offic- 
ers, ''plans and principles". Main object "to directly affect 
the Christian community/' and in non-slaveholding states. 

"Minutes of the first Anti-Slavery Society, formed in Miami University, 
12 June 1834. Members: Jared M. Stone. W. S. Rogers. J. Porter. E. 
Bullard. Alex McKinney, Dan'l Gilmer, Tho. E. Thomas. Colin McKlnney, 
and others. 

Miami University, June 12th, 1834. 

At 10 o'clock A. M.. a meeting was held by a portion of the students 
in this place, to take into consideration the condition of the oppressed 
people of color throughout the United States. 

W. S. Rogers was called to the chair. After solemn prayer, several 
persons present briefly expressed their views of the subject under con- 
sideration ; when it was unanimously resolved, that we organize ourselves 
into an Anti-Slavery Society. 

A committee was then appointed to draft a constitution, and present 
It at an adjourned meeting. Adjourned to meet on Tuesday evening next, 
at 7 o'clock P. M. 

Tuesday, June 17th. 

The Society met. M. E. W. Bullard in the chair. The committee 
presented the following constitution, which was adopted: 

The following is respectfully submitted to the public as the plans 
and principles of the Anti-Slavery Society of Miami University. 

1. Believing our cause to be not only the cause of justice and human- 
ity, but also the cause of God, we hope in all that we do. to be governed 
by the spirit of the Bible, to practice meekness and forbearance, and to 
rely upon the Sovereign of the Universe for aid and success. 

2. While it is our desire to inform the ignorant, to influence the 
intelligent and thinking part of our fellow citizens, on the subject of 
Negro Slavery, it is our object more immediately and directly to affect 
the Christian Community. 

3. We wish the citizens of our non-slaveholding states to feel deep- 
ly the importance of the abolition of slavery ; to feel that it is their duty 
not to look on as unconcerned and silent spectators, but "to be up and 
doing" ; "to cry aloud and spare not" ; to act as patriots and philan- 
thropists, as men deeply interested in the welfare of our whole country. 

After adopting the constitution the following persons were chosen to 
fill the offices therein specified: 

Pres. J. M. Stone. Sec. W. S. Rogers. Treas. J. Porter. 

Corresponding Com. 
E. W. Bullard. A. McKinney. D. Gilmer. 



Old and early Emancipatiomsts in this country. Their names 
and dates. Data about them, by Dr. Tuttle, President of 
Wabash College. Theo. D. Weld and Dr. Gamaliel Bailey. 
Weld's method of assault on slavery. 

Note. From a paper written by the Rev. Dr. Jos. F. 
Tuttle, President of Wabash College, we condense the following 
statement : 

"If one goes back to the old Emancipationists of this country, he will 
find among them Jonathan Edwards, younger ; Dr. Hopkins of New York ; 
Rev. Jacob Green of Hanover, N. J., father of Dr. Ashbel Green ; Benjamin 
Franklin, and a great many more. If we recur to the modern abolition 
movement, w-e find first of all Benjamin Lundy starting it in Virginia in 
1815, in 1819 arguing for freedom in St. Louis, in 1822 in East Tennessee 
publishing and lecturing against slavery, in 1823-4 going to Philadelphia 
to attend an Anti-Slavery Convention, in 1824 in Baltimore, in 1825 visit- 
ing Hayti, in 1828 associated with Mr. Garrison. Mr. Garrison, most 
people know, was an abolitionist forty years ago. Who else previous to 
1830? Mr. Adams began his anti-slavery career in 1837, in presenting in 
Congress a petition from slaves. James G. Birney became an abolitionist 
in 1834, and thence forward he fought a good fight despite mobs and social 
ostracism. Dr. Gamaliel Bailey, of the National Era, in 18.36 became Mr. 
Birney's associate in labor and suffering, being repeatedly mobbed in 
Cincinnati. In 1837 Salmon P. Chase entered upon his career by defend- 
ing a slave-woman before an Ohio court. In 1838 he claimed, in a news- 
paper article, the right of trial by jury for slaves ; in 1843 he was dis- 
tinguished in an Abolitionist Convention. 

"I am confident that the work of Theo. D. Weld, * and his com- 
panions, in abolitionizing Ohio is underrated. In the first place, it is- 
worth while to look at the time when these young men did their work. 
I cannot now recall a single leading man in Ohio who was then, in 
1833-4, directly agitating the subject of slavery. Dr. G. Bailey, Mr. 
Birney's able associate in the Philanthropist, was himself converted by 
the Lane students to their Anti-Slavery notions. In 1830 he went into 
that paper; the press and material of which were twice cast into the 

* As a specimen of Weld's method of assault upon slavery, we 
quote the following from one of his addresses: 

"Some years since, when traveling from Halifax in N. C, to Warren- 
ton in the same State, we passed a large drove of slaves on the way to 
Georgia. Before coming up with the gang, we saw at a distance a colored 
female, whose appearance and actions attracted our notice. I said to the 
driver, who was a slave, "What is the matter with that woman, is she 

crazy?" "No, Massa," said he, "I know her: it is . Her master 

sold her two children this morning, and she has been following along 
after them, and I suppose they have driven her back." By this time, we 
had come up with the woman. She seemed quite young. As soon as she 
recognized the driver, she cried out, "They've gone ! they've gone I Master 
would sell them. I told him I couldn't live without my children, — and I 
got away and followed after them, but the drivers whipped me back". 
The poor creature tossed her arms about with maniac wildness, and beat 
her bosom, and literally cast dust into the air. as she moved towards 
the village. At the last glimpse I had of her, she was nearly a quarter 
of a mile from us, still throwing handfuls of sand around her with the 
same frenzied air." — A. A. T. 

2 



river that year. It was not until 1836 that we hear of Salmon T. Chase, 
and then only as the protector of Mr. Birney from the Cincinnati mob. 
In 1837 he began his true career as the slave's friend, and commenced to 
unfold that glorious sentiment, 'Once free, aUcays free.' " 

"As for Benjamin F. Wade, we hear nothing of him until, in the 
Ohio Senate in 1837, he denoimced the annexation of Texas. 

"As early as 1834 there were few public men in Ohio, — almost none, — 
who either spoke or wrote against African Slavery. Except the Philan- 
thropist, which was started in 1834 or 1835. I do not now recall a single 
anti-slavery paper in the State. Even as late as 1845, the Whig news- 
papers of Ohio were opposed to the agitation of slavery, and the agitation 
was produced by other agencies mainly. 

"In 1834 the students of Lane Theological Seminary discussed the 
question of slavery, became anti-slavery, and were prohibited from discuss- 
ing it further by the Trustees, because of the risk of a mob. During a 
period of two years, from 1834 to 1836 there was intense agitation because 
of the most positive opposition to the discussion of slavery." 

The third annual report of the American Anti-Slavery Soci- 
ety, in 1836, showed 133 anti-slavery societies in Ohio, and gives 
the dates of their organization. Of all these, but seven were 
organized previous to 1834. 

Dr. Cyrus Prindle of Cleveland wrote a letter printed in 
"Matlack's Anti-Slavery Struggle in the M. E. Church," in 
which he says: 

"No one who was not a participant in the ecclesiastical proceedings in 
the Methodist Episcopal Church from 1835 to 1840, can have any idea of 
the embarrassments and sufferings to the abolitionists in those years of 
terrorism. The struggle and conflict in the Church that was the most 
trying and severe began about 1834." — A. A. T. 

FROM HIS MOTHER. 

Cholera infection in Butler County. Burials at Venice every 
day. Prof. McGnffey in the homes of Miami students. 

Paddy's Run, July 19th, 1834. 
My Dear Boy: 

If I am correct in the day of the month, this day, 52 years ago, 
ushered me into this world of changes; and I may say with Jacob, "few 
and evil have been the days of my pilgrimage, as it respects myself; but 
as it respects the Lord's dealings with me, I may say "goodness and 
mercy have followed me all the days of my life." And now on the 
threshold of eternity I desire to take a retrospective view of all my back- 
slidings and wanderings from Him. and come back again to that sure 
foundation "the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ." My own good works 
will not save me because they have been very, very few and all mixed 
with sin. Self-richteousness is a rock on which too many split. 

I only regret that I have not been more faithful to Him and im- 
proved the unspeakable privileges with which He has blessed me. and 
been more faithful to my children in instructing them in the Holy Scrip- 
tures and their duty to God and man. I can say that I have no greater 
pleasure than to see that my children are walking in the truth; and if 
life is desirable for anything, it is only this, that I might see the image 
of Christ stamped on each of them. They have been the children of 
many prayers and should I not live to see them, I believe they will all be 
brought into the fold of Christ. 

3 



Mr. McGuffey called aud left your parcel for which I thauk you. 
Your letter afforded us great pleasure at this solenui time. V\'e are all 
waiting the approach of cholera. There have beeu seven buried in this 
graveyard this week. Now I want to guard you against uneasiness. 
Elizabeth is at Venice, aud we are all using every precaution, by cleanli- 
ness, composure, and proper diet, and should the Lord see fit to visit us 
with the sickness, no means shall be left untried, and then I desire to 
say, "The will of the Lord be done." I feel thankful that three of you 
are at Oxford. No better place, or better help, should it reach that, and 
I do not wish one of you to come here. You can do us no good and 
perhaps coming in out of another air might take it and bring it to us. 

Monday morning. We are yet all well and I do not know of any new 
cases of cholera. We had a most delightfully solenm day yesterday. Mr. 
McGuffey preached to us on the threshold of eternity, and the people 
felfc it and requested that he would hold a meeting this morning at nine 
to return thanks to God that no appearance of cholera is among us as a 
church and to implore publicly His protection. Do not be more uneasy 
than necessary. We will write by next post and wish you to write too. 

Your affectionate mother, 

E. R. Thomas. 

Note. Kev. William Holmes McGuffey, D. D. LL. 1)., was 
born in 1800 of Scotch-Irish parents in Pennsylvania. He was 
graduated from Washington College, and was called to the chair 
of Languages in Miami University in 1820, before graduation. 
He was successively President of Cincinnati College, in 1837; 
President of Ohio University, Athens, 1839-45; and Professor of 
Moral Philosophy in the University of Virginia, 1845-73. He 
diec^in Charlottesville, Virginia, 1873. Two of his children are 
living, Mrs. Mary Stewart of Dayton, Ohio, and the wife of Dr. 
Andrew D. Hepburn, once President, and now Professor Emer- 
itus at Miami. 

I hold no letter of Dr. McGuffey's on the subject of slavery, 
and doubt if he ever wrote one. Some persons think any one is 
cold who is reticent, and Dr. McG. was ever reticent. "Con- 
temporary letters are facts :" and this chance letter is no unpleas- 
ant picture of him, at Darrtown, if you please, or at Venice, or 
other outlying hamlets that were Miami's constituencies. He 
was where in time of cholera, there were funerals needed every 
day, consoling the dying and burying the dead. In such homes as 
this letter came from, he was a welcome and distinguished guest, 
as he was later, in the cultured homes at Charlottesville, where 
he was to be a professor for the next thirty-eight years. 

He is most widely known by the series of School Readers 
prepared by him. If some of us can think of them only as the 
dog-eared books school boys pushed their elbows into, others will 
remember them differently. When Dr. McGuffey died, a writer 
in a Chicago paper claimed the selections in his Readers from 
Webster had been of essential use in maintaining Union senti- 
ment in the Northwest, in the hesitating time, before or early 
in the war of Secession. They were declaimed in every school 
house and were on the lips of hundreds of thousands of men and 



women who had been school children. These Readers lonj? had 
an exclusive use that none will have a2:ain. The newspaf)er and 
magazine of to-day were v,hoIly wanting; almost all ])rivate 
houses had no books except the Bible and school books; and of 
the latter, the Readers, he said, were longest preserved. 

My father, his old pupil, had a regard for Dr. Wm. H. 
McGuffey he had for no other man who was a teacher only. He 
preached but seldom as years went on, and then I can remember, 
when he came here, the large groups of educated people who lin- 
gered after church to show their respect. 

Any University consists of a place, and persons, and mem- 
ories. Modern life, they say, is deficient in ceremony: college 
Centennials are occasions for ceremony. The worth of Dr. 
William H. McGuffey is also "a tradition in many families." 
The children or children's children of his students live in nearly 
every state. If they can be reminded in June, they will honor 
his memory. Miami University will honor herself if she does the 
same thing.— A. A. T., May, 1909. 

Mother of TJwiiias E. Thomas. Her character and trials. Exul- 
tation tchen told that death approached. 

Note. Elizabeth Robinson, mother of Thomas E. Thomas, 
was born in England in 1782, and always lived in London lAtil 
her marriage to Thomas Thomas in 1808. She was the eldest 
daughter of Thomas Robinson, who was a deacon of the Inde- 
pendent Congregation of Stepney Chapel, and a prosperous mer- 
chant in the Russia tallow trade. 

Reared in comfort and plenty in early life; afterward with 
a family of five young children, in emigrating to America and 
living in the pioneer West, she saw her full share of all the diffi- 
culties and trials which could fall to the lot of such a woman. 
''We were," she afterwards said, "in every sense, missionaries 
except in the name and the support." She had many accomplish- 
ments, and her intelligence and cheerfulness made her welcome 
in any company all her days. 

It was his mother who prepared Thomas E. Thomas for 
college. She had an especial dislike for denominational or secta- 
rian partition walls, which people afterwards wondered at in her 
son. On his ordination, she wrote to him, "You were solemnly 
dedicated to God's service from the moment you drew your breath ; 
and in the most devoted, awfully solemn manner, dedicated to 
Him in baptism, by your dear Father. The vows of God are now 
upon you, and woe unto you if you draw back." 

If, in after life, when influenced by Dr. MacMaster, my father 
hesitated to say he would not commune with slaveholders, there 
was one old lady behind him who had no doubts on the subject ; 



nor, to the last, would she in church, fellowship with or sit to 
hear any of those who were "dealers in flesh and blood." 

What mother ever before wrote to her son : "Hold your little 
children loosely ; they are but lent treasures to be recalled anon : 
and have a care lest they take our thoughts from God!" To 
me, my grandmother always appeared to lie the last of the Puri- 
tans. 

Among the letters preserved by my father, is one endorsed 
by him "My last letter from my dear mother; she came to my 
house 6 April 1863, and died there G April 1864." 

When it was announced to this old saint that death ap- 
proached, her loud cries of triumph and rejoicing seemed strange 
to hear : she had no time for adieus or worldly concern ; heaven 
opened to her view. Her father and sisters, long gone before, 
she greeted repeatedly by name, as though they stood at her 
side, as they did in reality to her; thus it was till the coma of 
death stopped her voice. ''So she passed over; and all the 
trumpets sounded on the other side," — A. A. T. 

FROM THEODORE JOHNSON, A CLASSMATE AT MIAMI 
UNIVERSITY. 

An inside view of slavery. Ed/iucation and due religious instruc- 
tion withheld. 

Beverly, Adams Co., Miss., Jan. 25, 183G. 
Dear brother: 

I have heard of you only once since I left ; but was pleased to learn 
that your school was prospering. I have delayed writing, but have been 
endeavoring to collect the information that you desired me to communi- 
cate; although it is universally the opinion here that such information 
should not be communicated, even privately, to particular friends. I 
shall tell you only what I see and hear, and know to be true. Who, ex- 
cept those who do evil and hate the light, were ever afraid to have others 
know their manners and customs? The greatest injustice of these people 
is their withholding from the slaves the privilege of learning the Gospel, 
either by reading or hearing preaching. In Natchez a sermon is preached 
to the slaves every Sabbath afternoon, in the Methodist Church, and some 
are permitted to attend. But in the country the slaves live and die almost 
as ignorant of religion as the mules and oxen they drive. I know of but 
four plantations where religious instruction is permitted. One of them is. 
Mr. Chase's, a Presbyterian minister, who preaches to his own slaves, 
and none within five miles around him are permitted to go and hear him. 
Neither is he permitted to go and preach to them at home. The slaves 
of Mr. H — 's plantation hold meetings by themselves. One leads, sings, 
prays, talks ; but as he cannot read and does not hear any Scripture read, his 
talking is vain repetition, that does little or no good. About a month after 
I came here, I aslsed Mr. H. if he had any objections to my reading the 
Scripture to the slaves on the Sabbath. His answer was, "Yes sir, I do 
not wish anything of the kind done." Shortly after this, while reading 
in my own room on the Sabbath, two slaves, about 14 years old, came to 
me with a spelling book and asked me to hear them read. I should have 
been glad to hear them and talk about their souls; but knowing their 
master's views, I sent them away just as they came. Where no preaching 
is allowed, the Sabbath, of course, is not regarded as a sacred day. All 

6 



extra work is attended to. which might interrupt regular business of the 
week. Last Sunday, I walked out at noon to the quarters. I there saw 
four slaves washing clothes, one man repairing the roof of his house ; one 
nailing old boards over the crevices in the wall, etc. 

I accomplish little in study beyond miscellaneous reading and don't 
know when I shall be prepared for the work of the ministry. I have no 
religious associates here, and my graces are very low. 

Among the students who were at Miami during the five years 
T. E. Thomas was there, and who as undergraduates knew and 
influenced each other, were Wm. S, Groesbeck, Jno. J. McRae, 
Jos. G. Monfort, Wm. B. Caldwell, Samuel F. Gary, Wm, Denni- 
son, Jere H. Peirce, Wm. R. Rogers, James Birney, the son of 
Jas. G. Birney, Free-Soil nominee for president, Chauncey N. 
Olds, Thomas P. Townsley, Samuel Galloway, Benj. W. Chidlaw, 
Charles Anderson, Jas. J. Faran, T. Lyle Dickey, Freeman Gary, 
Robt. H. Bishop, Jr., Thornton A. Mills, Albert Galloway, David 
H. Bruen and Jared M. Stone. 

Many others of character and influence throughout their 
lives would not be known by the reader, if recalled by name. 
One roomed with my father during his early Oxford years. In 
debate at the ''Lit," some one said, "I do not want by severity to 
discourage my opponent. He is 'The Hope of Tod's Fork.' '' This 
was a creek in Warren county. The students never after called 
him by any other name. At the date of reopening of Miami, 
just fifty years afterwards, a tottering old clergyman went by, 
led by his daughter. Gov. Charles Anderson then told me the 
storv, which I knew. "There." said he, "is 'The Hope of Tod's 
Fork,' " 

FROM JARED M. STONE, A CLASSMATE AT MIAMI UNIVERSITY 

Lexington, Ky., March 4, 1836. 
Brother Thomas : — 

My carelessness, I fear, has given you just cause to think that I had 
forgotten you, or my promise, at least, to write to you soon. In a short 
time after I left you last October, I went in search of a school, and 
found a situation, at last after tramping about for three or four weeks. 
This business of hunting up schools is fine exercise indeed, you know 
something about it perhaps. I went down to Louisville and New Albany, 
searched about in that quarter several days, but found no opening such 
as I chose to engage in. Passing on to Lexington, Ky., I found a country 
classical school, about five miles from the city, where I have been staying 
ever since. But my school, though tolerably agreeable, is not of such an 
interesting character as to require a particular description. I should like 
to know how you are getting along at Franklin, as well as I am here, 
and better no doubt. This Kentucky liberality— bah — they hug their gold 
dust with as strong a grip as even the penurious Yankee ! I knew some- 
thing about the people in Ohio and Indiana, that gathering money from 
them was like gathering figs from thistles ; but in respect to the Ken- 
tucklans I was somewhat like Dick Whittington when he supposed the 
streets of London to be paved with gold. But never mind, say I. Bread 
is earned by the sweat of the brow. 



How do you stand now in respect to Abolition? I have not seen Cal- 
houn's Report in Congress. He, no doubt, pours out upon the heads of 
those — fanatics — incendiaries — as the Southerners call the Abolitionists — 
a sea of wrath. He is a strong man, and likely to be right where his 
head is not perverted by passion and prejudice ; Calhoun has no small 
share of Southern feeling, and prejudice. You take Birney's publication, 
I suppose. I have seen no numbers of it. I have just been reading the 
^—address of the Kentucky Synod to the Churches under its care, written 
\ by J. C. Young, and of c-ourse, breathing the very spirit of Gradualism. 
^It is an able document, however, and I am , on the whole, well pleased 
with it. Kentucky, no doiibt, exhibits slavery in its mildest forms, but 
even here there is enough to cause the very heart to sicken. The system of 
domestic slavery is execrable, dark and damning, view it as you will. 
But it cannot stand. 

You will be present when the Presbytery meets, and I hope to see 
you then. What progress do you make in theological study? Do you 
read any system regularly? Teaching and regular systematic study do 
not harmonize entirely. :Much may be accomplished, however, by dili- 
gence and perseverance. 

Have you any doubts respecting the received doctrine of the Trinity? 
That the Beings designated by the titles. Father, Son and Holy Spirit are 
invested with all the attributes of deity is abundantly clear, but that 
there exist three distinct persons in the divine Essence, it seems to me 
a difficult matter to prove from the Scriptures. Do not the titles above 
designate the several }7todcs under which the Sovereign has chosen to re- 
veal himself to the children of Men? 

Dr. Jarcd M. Stone; history; qiiaUtij and service as a college 
teacher. Early Western teachers poorly paid. 

Note. Uev. Jared M. Stone, D. D., was born at New Milford, 
Conn., in 1808, removed to the west in 1829 with his father's family 
which settled in Franklin Co., Indiana, near Harrison, O. Soon 
thereafter entering Miami University, he was graduated, taking 
the first honors of his class. Afterward he taught at Oxford, and, 
at the same time, pursued his studies for the ministry under the 
direction of Drs. Bishop, McGuflfey and Scott. Dr. Scott has 
written of him that ''he not only stood first in scholarship in one 
of the largest classes which the University ever graduated, but 
extended his reading and studies over a wider field of science, lit- 
erature and general intelligence outside of the regular college 
curriculum." 

Dr. Stone was married in 183G, to Miss Abbie Clark of Con- 
way, Mass., who had for some time been principal of a select 
girls' school at Oxford; and first became pastor of the Presby- 
terian Church at Connersville, Indiana. 

In Sept., 1841, he l)egan his labors in the Tresbyterian 
Church at Springdale, Hamilton Co., O., the membership of 
which was scattered over a large territory. In ministering to 
these people he held services at five or six separated places, and 
this involved time, labor and endurance in travel over bad roads, 
little realized at the present time. Thirty-two persons were at 
once, received here on examination. 



From Springdale, Dr. S. went to New Albany, Ind., to teach 
a female seminary; and from thence, at the urgent call of Dr. 
Thomas, accepted a Professorship in Hanover College, where he 
remained six years, acting as President for two years after Dr. 
T. left in 1854. Thereafter, he was for two years professor in 
Iowa State University, at Iowa City; and from 1858 to 1863, 
i)astor of the Church and Principal of an Academy at Prince-, 
ville, Peoria Co., 111. In 1871, Dr. Stone removed to Old Du 
Quoin, where he continued teaching and preaching, until after 
fortv years of self-sacrificing labor, and about two years after 
the death of Dr. Thomas, he followed him, on Oct. 10, 1876. 

"Where did you get so much mathematics in Illinois?" 
asked the examiner at Union College, N. Y., of one of his pupils 
who had presented himself there for admission. Although the 
mathematics and natural science were his chosen specialty, his 
fellow Professors at Hanover used to say, as was said elsewhere 
of Dr. MacMaster, that when unexpectedly called, he would 
teach any other department as well as its regular instructor. 

Dr. Jonathan Edwards, in an historical address at McCor- 
mick Theology Seminary, stated that no one familiar with early 
church educational enterprises in the West would be disposed to 
complain because they were not more liberally supported. Times 
were hard : money was scarce and not generally in the hands 
of those willing and under obligation to give: yet the fact 
remains that in their early days, most of the Colleges in the 
West starved with Professors. Now, most of them have endow- 
ments and wealth ; but wealth cannot often buy such instruction 
as Prof. Stone gave, for a generation, to seminaries and pupils 
who were not able to pay for it. Rev. C. Sturdevant, in his letter 

on page , states that while Principal of a female seminary 

at New Albany, Prof. Stone agreed "not to disturb the har- 
mony of that institution with his views about slavery". Per- 
haps this was true; but it is also true that from boyhood, and 
throughout his life, Jared M. Stone was a staunch, reliable, 
moderate, intelligent and outspoken abolitionist. — A. A. T. 

No note is needed in this volume more than one on ''The 
Breckinridges ; espccialhj Rev. Dr. Roht. ./., Rev. Dr. John C. 
Young: 'The Kotituckg Emancipationists' and 'Gradualism f " 
and none would be so hard to write. The Note was prepared but 
withheld unfinished, for want of some information which lay 
only in MSS. or pamphlet prints. These I was foiled in try- 
ing to get. 

In American historical studies, no subject ought to be so 
tempting to a biographer as the story of the Breckinridge family 
and its connections, in relation to the anti-slavery struggle in 
Church and State. The topic seems never to have been touched 
by any one competent and informed, for fear of rousing varied 

9 



resentment in hostile factions of the high class of people from 
whom such a biographer would wish a continuance of existing 
good-will. ''I^t us have peace" ; but that was never the motto 
of the Breckinridge family. The Rev. Dr. Robt. J. probably 
never had peace on any subject, with any person, at any place 
during a long and tempestuous life. For all that, he was a glory 
of a man ; second to none, I believe, in the United States, of 
(hose who never held any official position. 

The future biographer will find his difficulty, not in telling 
the truth, for no one could fail to do that about Rev. Dr. R. J. B.: 
— the old doctor never gave anybody a chance to; — but the diffi- 
culty will be to let men and events have a due relation and pro- 
portion, and to give actual and adequate background. 

Most historians and biographers tell the truth. Rev. Dr. 
Halsey, in his history of the McCormick Theological Seminary, 
does, but if his subjects have any pro or anti-slavery record, 
he covers the exposed parts with two coats of white-wash. 
His hope and wish is that all men may look alike. And they 
do when he has got through with them. The Rev. Dr. Charles 
Hodge of Princeton was a past master in this biographical art. 
Dr. Jared Sjjarks was an eminent offender in his line; he would 
omit words and lines in Washington's letters and elucidate the 
text until "there was nothing left of Washington but a steel 
engraving", having a fixed expression of piety and dignified peace. 
I can strike words or lines from the letters and addresses of 
Rev. Drs. E. D. MacMaster, Thomas E. Thomas, Jno. W. Scott, 
and of Nathan L. Rice. George Junkin, Palmer and Charles 
Hodge, to the somewhat "promotion of the peace of the church", 
and to the disaccommodation of the truth. 



My father throughout his life abounded in stories of the Rev. 
Dr. R. J. Breckinridge. He once came to Miami and examined 
a class in ancient history. "Where is Smyrna?", he asked a 
student. "Do you allude to its location, Sir?", asked the stu- 
dent. "Yes," said the old doctor, "I allude to its location, and 
anv thing else about it comprehended by the word, "Where." — 
A.'^A. T., May, 1909. 

No one in the United States understood Kentucky "Gradual- 
ism" better than President Lincoln. During the four long years, 
he kept his finger on her i)ulse, forgave her her trespasses, argued 
her case against her enemies, and, at last, won her confidence. 
He gave Missouri the same treatment with less success, because 
there were less able men there. 

The events of the war cured Dr. Robt. J. Breckinridge of 
Gradualism. At Baltimore, when Lincoln was renominated, he 
called the great convention to order. All the country listened. 
He said, "They tell us what we will do is unconstitutional. We 
will change our Constitution if it suits us to do so." 

10 



FROM REV. DR. ROBERT H. BISHOP. PRESIDENT OF MIAMI 

UNIVERSITY. 

My dear Friend : Oxford, September 1, 1836. 

As some new arrangements are to be made in Miami 
University, my thoughts have been tending toward you. Be 
pleased to let me know if it would be agreeable to you to cast 
in your lot with us here. 

^ My plan is that you should be styled Professor of Rhetoric 
and Greek Literature, and instruct the Sophomores and Jun- 
iors; Horace's Art of Poetry and select portions of the Greek 
classics to be your standing text books. The salary will be |600, 
with the prospect of being increased to seven or eight hundred 
should you succeed. 

As the plan is wholly my own, I wish to have your opinion 
on it before I state so much in the preparatory announcement. 

Let me hear then from you immediately. 
Sincerely yours, 

R. H. Bishop. 

P. S. Remember me affectionately to your mother. 

FROM HIS MOTHER. 

Defense of slavery in Warren County churches. What this Eng 
lish mother thinks and does in consequence. Remembers 
struggles in England for emancipation. Tells her son to 
"stand his ground". 

My Dear Son: Franklin, O., Sept. 4, 1839. 

As my mind is full of concern I sit down this evening to 
unburthen it to you. * * * i believe the people in Franklin 
Church are dwindling most of them into mere formalists. I 
hope better things of the over river people, for I understand 
Mr. Hudson invited a slaveholder to assist him on the last Sab- 
bath; and the people would not let him come, but requested 
that you might be invited; on your refusal, Mr. Coffee of I^b- 
anon supplied. I do not know what Mr. H — is at heart, but 
he preached two Wednesday lectures from the passage where 
Paul sent Onesimus, the runaway slave, as Mr. H— called him, 
back to his master. From this, and other passages, he proved 
that there were slaves in the Apostles' day, and that they ran 
away from their masters; and that the Apostle thought right 
to send them back again. I suppose this was to support the 
"Ohio Black Laws"; and likewise slavery had been established 
in the patriarchal days, and was a wise appointment. Now all 
this he might have said, if he had made a comparison between 
the patriarchal slaves and the Kentucky slaves, — but no! that 
must be concealed for some abolitionist to divulge, poor fellow, 
and get his head shot off for it. Well, truth will come out, and 

11 



I believe that it will not be lonj; before people will be ashamed 
of such concealnieuts. Ministers have to turn the tuh sometimes^ 
vou know, and perhaps this was one of the old Kcnfuck sermons. 
It would do very well there now. Mr. H — closed the services 
with "The Lord dismiss us", etc. I was asked why I did not 
sing. I told them because I expected tlie Lord would dismiss 
me with His curse if I did. This is an uncomfortable state to 
be in; (but it is so). Since that we had a right hot coloniza- 
tionist preach at the Methodist meeting-house; and he under- 
took to make out the abolitionists such vile fellows; that is, 
they had acted so unwisely in all their exertions and had done 
nothing, that I took my leave of the house before he had pro- 
ceeded far; so you see we have colonization here as well as at 
Hamilton. But never fear; so we had in England, and in the 
British Parliament for twenty years. But Clarkson and Wilber- 
force were conquerors I Stand your ground!! Don't flinch one 
inch!!! * 



*NoTE. The punctuation given follows the MS. Abraham 
Lincoln said, "Some people claim ])un(tuation is a matter of 
rule; with me it is a matter of feeling.'' With my grandmother 
it evidently was a matter of emphasis. (A. A. T.) 

TO PROFESSOR JNO. W. SCOTT. 

T. E. Thomas goes to the anti-slaverij convention at Massillon; 
Reasons why. Messages he wants from Oxford people. 

My Dear Sir: Hamilton, O., May 13, 1840. 

I have concluded to attend the annual meeting of the O. 
Anti-Slavery Society, at Massillon, Stark Co. It meets May 
27th. I go as a delegate from the society in this place; and 
shall accompany Bro. Blanchard. My reasons for attending, 
at this time, are several. First, my health, I hope will be im- 
proved, by a gentle ride of 200 miles. Then, I shall have an 
opportunity of seeing the capital of our State, and a large dis- 
trict of country with which I am almost wholly unacquainted. 
An opportunity of botanising, a little, at this season of the 
year, in a diagonal line across Ohio, is of some importance. 
Of more value is the privilege of forming an acquaintance with 
a large number of individuals of whom I have heard something, 
and who will attend the Convention. I have some curiosity, 
(may my old school brethren forgive!) to look at Finney, who 
is to be there. A large number of Western Reserve ])eople will 
be present; and T wish to see a little of Western Reserve char- 
acter; having heard the fame thereof with my ears. Tt will be 
some pleasure to meet Burgess, and Crothers. and Rankin, and 
Buffuu), &c. But, above all these, and next to my love for the 
Anti-Slavery cause, that which determined me to attend, was, 

12 



the importance of the meeting at the present crisis. The ques- 
tion of political action, the propriety or impropriety of sustain- 
ing a third party, will be discussed, and decided in some way. 
And that decision will have no little influence upon abolitionists, 
both in Ohio and elsewhere. For my own part, I am opposed, at 
present, to such a third party; though I cannot vote for either 
Van Buren or Gen'l Harrison. Both are devoted to the slave- 
holding interest. But what I fear is, that, should the aboli- 
tionists decide in favor of the new nominations, and combine as 
a political party, they would lose much of their moral influence; 
and many would be deterred from sustaining the anti-slavery* 
cause, wiio would, otherwise, cheerfully support it. Ministers, 
for instance, would feel that, in supporting abolitionists as a 
third party, proposing candidates for the Presidency of the U. S. 
they were entering too fully into politics; and many would fear 
to "draw upon themselves the opposition of the present parties. 
Still, I believe that abolitionists are bound to use their suffrages 
in favor of freedom; and I know not how they can, consistently 
with duty, vote for Van Buren or Harrison. 

Should you or Dr. Bishop, or any of the abolitionists of 
Oxford think proper to communicate your views on this subject, 
either to be employed at the Anniversary, or, should you prefer 
it, only to aid me in understanding the public sentiment in this 
region, that I may the better represent it, I shall be glad. I 
do not suppose that either the Dr. or yourself would wish your 
names to be used. I am anxious that this, among other ques- 
tions, should be settled aright; and, as there will be a large 
attendance from the upper end of the State, where the third 
party is popular, I deem it important that our section should 
be represented as fully as possible. And, as I suppose that many 
will be prevented from attending, by the distance, I feel it my 
duty to go. I shall pass through Springfield, taking J. Galloway 
witii us. if possible; and by Columbus, and Granville. 

I intend to take a Peace-Maker with me; and if urgent re- 
quests succeed, will bring home a good list of subscribers. 

My love to Mrs. S. and family. 

Could not the abolitionists of Oxford hold a meeting this 
week, and send up a written report of what they did the past 
year, for the slave, and what tlieij intend doing the coming yearf 
I should \y% happy to take it; and the Society requests such in- 
formation. 

Prof. John W. ^cott. Ancestry. Education, Sketch of his life, 
and service as a college instructor. Beautiful old age. 
Death. 

Note: The Rev. John Witherspoon Scott, D. D., was born 
January 22, 1800, and was graduated at Washington College in 

13 



1823. He then took post-g:raduate work in science, under Pro- 
fessor Silliman in Yale College, from which he received his Mas- 
ters' Degree. 

"The Laird of Arras," as he was called, was an officer in 
the army of the Covenanters, at the battle of Both well Bridge. 
His son, John, born in the north of Ireland, came to America in 
1741. when fifty years old, and became one of the first trustees of 
the Neshaming church, in Pennsylvania. With him came his son 
William, whose son was the Rev, Geo. McElroy Scott, who was 
educated under Dr. Ewing of Philadelphia, the founder of the 
University of Pa., and studied theology under Dr. Witherspoon 
of Princeton. He was an eminent minister of the Presbyterian 
Church; was active in missions among the Indians, near San- 
dusky, Ohio, and was one of the founders of Washington Col- 
lege. In this institution, his son, the Rev. John Witherspoon 
Scott, D. D., the subject of this note, became a professor. In 
1828, he became professor of Mathematics in Miami University. 
It was the character and the teaching of Drs. Bishop, McGuffey 
and Scottr of them so preeminently that no other names need 
be now mentioned, which gave its early and deserved fame to 
Miami University. From Miami, Dr. Scott followed Dr. Bishop 
to Farmer's College, but four years afterward he opened the 
Oxford Female College, at the head of which for ten years he 
exerted a wide influence. Afterward he was, for a short time, 
at Hanover College, then two years at the State University, 
Springfield, 111., then seven years at Monongahela, Pa., and 
afterwards took a position in the Pension Bureau at Wash- 
ington, the duties of which, despite of very advanced years, he 
continued faithfully to discharge until a recent dnte. 

"The chair for which he was trained by its greatest master 
of that day in the New World, he occupied for fifty-three years ;" 
but of these Miami had only seventeen, 1828-1845. 

He is the father of Mrs. Benjamin Harrison, the present 
mistress of the White House, where he is now living at the 
remarkable age of ninety-two. To him, with this correspondence, 
the children of his early friend w^ould send respectful greetings. 
May he live, in his own years, to complete a wonderful century 
of the life of the Republic, and to see all the fruits of the 
victory, as he has already seen the beginning and the end of the 
Anti-Slavery Conflict— A. A. T. 

Geo. Alfred Townsend wrote of Prof. Scott, "A more whole- 
some and beautiful man of his age I have never seen anywhere." 
He accompanied his daughter's funeral cortege from Washington 
to Indianapolis, and returned to die in the White House a month 
later, Nov. 29, 1892. On the Sunday morning before he died, 
hearing his niece at the piano in an adjoining room, he asked 
her to play "Abide With Me;" then with low but steady voice 
he sang all of Henry Francis Lyte's hymn: 

14 



Abide with me: fast falls the eventide; 
The darkness deepens ; Lord with nie abide ! 
When other helpers fail, and comforts flee, 
Help of the helpless, oh, abide with me! 

Not a brief glance I beg, a passing word, 
But as thou dwell'st with thy disciples, Lord, 
Familiar, condescending, patient, free. 
Come, not to sojourn, but abide with me. 

I need thy presence every passing hour ; 
What but thy grace can foil the tempter's power, 
Who like thyself my guide and stay can be? 
Thro' cloud and sunshine, ob. abide with me ! 

Swift to its close ebbs out life's little day ; 
Earth's joys grow dim. its glories pass away: 
Change and decay in all around I see; 
O thou, who changest not, abide with me! 

—A. A. T., May 1909. 

TO PROF. J. W. SCOTT, OXFORD, O. 

T. E. Thomns preaches against slavery at Spnngfield , Ohio; what 
happened. Butler County anti-slavery society formed. 

Hamilton, June 11, 1840. 
On Saturday last I returned home, after an absence of three 
weeks, and a journey of five hundred miles. I had a very pleas- 
ant trip. The weather was firm and the roads good. I passed 
through Dayton, Spring-field, Columbus, Granville, Millersburg; 
and on my return, Coshocton, on the Tuscarawas; and Zanes- 
ville on the Muskingiim. I saw a large and very pleasant por- 
tion of our State, to which I had been an entire stranger. Our 
meeting at Massillon was a highly interesting one. For particu- 
lars I refer you to the Philanthropist of this week. On my way 
out I stopped at Springfield. Brother Galloway had a regular 
lecture that evening, (Wednesday), and he asked me to supply 
his pulpit. I promised to preach on slavery, to which he con- 
sented. A pretty good congregation was collected. Soon after I 
commenced, three gentlemen left the house. The remainder 
seemed surprised and ofl'ended, at first; but before I closed, they 
were more patient and attentive. Next morning, as I left the 
tavern, I overheard Wallace, one of the trustees, saying to an- 
other, "It is an imposition. We went to hear the Gospel and 
not to be blackguarded about abolition!" On my return, I 
learned that the day I left, the trustees of Mr. G's church met, 
and passed a strong resolution of censure on him for permitting 
me to lecture on slavery. The congregation was quite in a hub- 
bub. Next Sabbath Brother Galloway preached on pulpit in- 
dependence; and at the close of his discourse, informed his peo- 
ple that he was about to leave them. He told them of the resolu- 
tion passed by the trustees, which, I believe, prohibited him from 

15 



introducing the subject of slavery, or allowing- its introduction 
by another. He informed them that he would never {)reach for 
a church where his mouth was closed on any subject connected 
with his message as a minister; that he had been with them 
some eight years, and that perhaps it was for the best that they 
should separate. His peoi)le were surprised and grieved. Next 
day the session met, and with tears requested him to reconsider 
his resolution. Happily, that week the day for election of trus- 
tees arrived. The congregation turned out the old ones, first 
requiring tliem to exscind and exchange their recorded resolu- 
tion against Brother (J. ; elected a new Board, and closed by giv- 
ing Mr. Galloway full liberty to say whatever he thought proper 
upon slavery. He himself gave me this information. He said 
that for a week, he was in great trouble about duty; but that 
having prayerfully adopted the above course, he was now re- 
joiced to find that he w^as more firmly fixed in the confidence 
and aff'ections of his people than ever before; that he felt thank- 
ful Providence had now opened the way for him to plead a 
cause which he had long desired to aid, but which he had feared 
to introduce, lest the church should be injured. 

I had the pleasure of meeting several good Old and New 
school, and Conservative brethren; Hitchcock of ('olumbus, a 
young man lately come; Little of Granville; Warner of Massilon; 
Blodget of Euclid; Pres. Mahan, and Prof. Morgan of Oberlin, per- 
fectionists, in a sad error, but most amiable, gentle, Christian- 
like men; Crothers and Dickey; and finally on my return, Barnes, 
Galloway, Crane of Madison, Ind., Russell, Coe and Hudson, at 
Franklin, where they had met to install Brother H — . 1 found 
a general disposition of regret for the past, and a desire of 
friendly connection and intercourse in future. Even Brother 
Crane, who voted the excision act in the Assembly of '.S7, admit- 
ted that it was with great pain that he had brought himself up 
to the voting point, on that occasion. 

We are about to form a Butler County Anti-Slavery Society. 
Last Thursday evening, at a meeting of our Hamilton and Ross- 
ville Anti-Slavery Society, we passed a resolution, inviting the 
abolitionists of the county to meet here on the 4th of July. Fri- 
day evening, July 3d, we wish them to be here; when an ad- 
dress will be delivered by Blanchard, or Brisb«ane of Cincinnati; 
and on Saturday morning, at 8 or 9 o'clock, we shall hold a 
business meeting, for the ado})tion of a ('oustitution, and for 
organization. We wish to meet that early, July 4, that we may 
not interfere with the other celebrations in the place. Perhaps 
we may have a second address during the day. You best know 
whether it would be pro})er for you to be here. I should be glad 
to see you, did you feel it your duty. At any rate, please tell 
Mr. Woods, and all the abolitionists of your town and neighbor- 
hood, and let them come down, one and all. We shall be able 

16 



and happy, to accommodate all who may come on Friday after- 
noon. We are anxious to have a large meeting; and to form an 
eflBcient County Society. Tell Brother Graham to come down. 
I am particuhirly desirous that he should be present; Brother 
Robertson, too; for he is too good an abolitionist to be absent. 
Let us remember that we are in bonds, as bound with them. 
"If thou dost not deliver them that are drawn unto death, and 
those that are ready to be slain ; if thou say, behold we knew it 
not, doth not He that pondereth the heart see it," &c. 

TO PROFESSOR JNO. W. SCOTT. 

How shall abolitionists vote? Can ministers take a<)tive part in 

politics? 

Hamilton, July 11, 1840. 

A day or two since, I received a line from Dr. Bailey, re- 
questing me to forward to Jas. C. Ludlow, Esqr., the name of 
some individual who would serve as a presidential elector on the 
anti-slavery ticket. I suppose that some one of your citizens 
will be suitable; as I have understood that some of the aboli- 
tionists among you advocate a third party. Though I am in 
favor of withholding my vote, rather than casting it for Birney, 
yet, as Dr. Bailey says, if our friends will vote, let them have 
the right sort of a ticket. It seems to me to be of no importance 
which of the two courses we take, provided it be known that we 
adopt one or the other, as a body, and from principle. 

You have seen, perhaps, the call for a county meeting at 
Mt. Pleasant, to discuss the question of duty in the approaching 
election, and to form a ticket such as abolitionists may properly 
sustain; I mean a ticket for the county. The principal object 
is to pass a resolution declarative of our opposition to both 
presidential candidates for their servility to slavery. I have 
been requested to address the meeting; and though my opinions 
are fixed, and in favor of such a resolution, and though I ad- 
vocated it earnestly at Massillon, yet I have had some doubts 
respecting my duty as a minister in connection with these 
political subjects. 'On the one hand I would not venture too 
far; nor interfere with matters that do not concern me; and 
injure my ministerial usefulness. On the other hand, I would 
not, through a fear of injurious consequences to myself, neglect 
to use any proper influence in behalf of the slave. In mere party 
politics I have no desire to dabble; but in great questions of 
morals and public justice, ministers, it appears to me, are bound 
to let their voice be heard. John Calvin aided the Syndics of 
Geneva in political affairs. John Knox preached and prayed 
about politics. Rich. Baxter, Dr. Calamy, and a host of others, 
used their influence for the re-establishment of Charles II. 
Donald Cargill, Rich. Cameron and the Covenanters meddled 
with politics. So did Dr. Witherspoon, and the Presbyterians, 

17 



in the revolution, who thought it not improper to. urge their 
hearers, from the pulpit, to battle in defence of their liberties. 
It may be said that Paul did not concern himself with the 
political affairs of his day; but I would reply that had Nero been 
a candidate for the empire, and had Paul and other Christians 
possessed the right of suffrage, he would neither have supported 
Nero by his vote, nor have failed to use his influence with the 
churches against that tyrant. 

Have you seen Dyer Burgess' criticism on Xeiporovew ? (to 
ordain)? It is in the Philanthropist- of June 30. He says that 
civil and ecclesiastical rulers are alike ordained of God through 
the election, (lifting up the hand), by the people; and that 
voting, and voting properly, is a sacred duty. Surely then it 
is not improper for us to consult together respecting the best 
mode of discharging that duty. 

I set out with an intention of asking your advice on this 
subject of duty. I sui>pose you will think 1 am like the young 
lady whom Burns mentions as requesting the opinion of her 
sister on a delicate and important affair : 

Come counsel, dear titty, don't tarry ; 

I'll give you my bonny black hen 

If you will advise me to marry 

The lad I love dearly, Tarn Glen ! 

We formed a County Society the other day. Few attended; 
but — a handful of corn upon the top of the mountains, etc. We 
are publishing Dr. Brisbane's address, with the Constitution, 
minutes, etc. 

Please send me the name of some respectable man who will 
serve as elector on the Birney ticket. 

T. E. Thomas. 

FROM REV. JOHN RANKIN. 

AhoUtionists in the Harrison campaign of IS'fO. 

Ripley, Ohio, July 31, 1840. 
Brother Thomas : 

I received your kind letter, and I should be happy to attend your 
convention were it practicable. I am somewhat doubtful as to the pro- 
priety of holding a convention for deliberation when men are too excited 
to deliberate. It seems to me to be too near the time of election to answer 
a good purpose. Abolitionists are divided in sentiment, and there is 
danger of alienation in case they meet in contest at a convention. 

I have had much hesitancy in my own mind in deciding what is best 
to be done at the coming election. I have endeavored to examine the 
matter with care. I have set abolitionism as the highest interest, and 
have endeavored to ascertain what will, ujmn the whole, promote it. I 
believe a change in the administration will be best for abolition. The 
Van Buren party is no less hostile than the Whig, and more slanderous, 
because the more powerful. There is no sacrifice of principle in so voting 
as to keep out of power the more dangerous party. It implies no appro- 
bation of the party put in power. Whig Abolitionists are so situated that 

18 



they cannot avoid putting one of the parties in power. If they do not 
vote for Harrison, they do as much for Van Buren as so many Demo- 
crats who put in their votes for him. I abhor the Whig party, and 
sustain it only because it is the best I can do for abolition, and for the 
country. 

My belief is that the Whig abolitionists ought to distinctly state the 
ground on which they will vote, and then vote for Harrison. It is safer 
for abolition to have the weaker party in power. It is plausibly said 
that in voting for Tyler we sustain slavery ; but there is no truth in it. 
Do we, when we vote for a man to do public service, sustain his personal 
immoralities? If so, we could never vote with propriety. Where is the 
candidate for whose personal conduct we would be willing to be held 
responsible? The Lord chose Saul, and Jehu, but did he approve of 
their personal conduct? Suppose a missionary in a heathen land were 
allowed to vote for chiefs, and two candidates were before the people, 
both idolaters, one of them in favor of extirpating Christianity, and the 
other an enemy to it, but disposed to tolerate it. Does the missionary 
in voting for the idolater who is in favor of tolerating Christianity 
sustain Idolatry by his vote? He would sustain idolatry, in such case, 
were he to stay from the polls and refuse to vote. The principle I act on 
is that as a citizen I am bound to prevent evil. If I cannot prevent it 
all, I must prevent as much of it as I can. I am bound to cast my vote 
for the better side and against the greater evil. If there be no better 
side, then I may stay from the polls. If there be no better side then I 
am mistaken In my judgment. I believe, upon the whole, there 
is a better side, and that the interests of abolitionism and the nation 
require a change in the administration. The Democratic party are dan- 
gerous to our own liberty as well as that of the slave. If we are to do 
anything for the liberation of slaves we must have liberty ourselves, and 
we must have^some pecuniary means. When I vote to put the Whig 
party In power. I vote for the means of doing something for the slave. 
Convince me that the parties have been and still are equal in dependence 
on us, In power and in all their bearings on the question of slavery, and 
I will stay from the polls. But if any difference does exist, so that there 
Is a better side, then you may look for me on that side. 

If abolitionists will not fellowship me, then I will stand for the 
slave alone, and do what I can, as I did in days past. If voting on this 
principle is inconsistent with abolitionism, I have always been incon- 
sistent and am likely always to be so. 

You will now easily see the principle on which I act ; if it be wrong. 
I am wrong of course. And If so, I hope I shall have your pity and 
your prayers. If the Lord has given you more light, he will expect you 
to act In accordance with it. If he has left me in darkness, it Is because 
my heart Is wrong, and I am not so willing as I ought to be to know the 
truth. "He that doeth evil hateth the light." 

"■M^ho abolished slavery?" iieecher said- "John Rankin and his 
nine sons did it." Note hy Gen. Birney ahout Rankin. 

Note. ''When Henry Ward Beecher was asked after the 
war, 'Who abolished slavery?' he is said to have answered, 'Rev. 
John Rankin and his seven sons did it'. His anti-slavery services 
were very great. Many Western men have called him 'the father 
of abolitionism' ; and it was not an uncommon thing in the 
thirties to hear him called "the Martin Lnther" of the cause. 
In 1827, the year in which New York abolished slavery within 

19 



her limits, John Rankin was one of the five most prominent 
advocates in this country of immediate abolition. He was also 
one of the earliest. Chas. Osborne and Rev. Geo. Bourne date 
as abolitionists from 1814 ; John Rankin and I^enjamin Lundy 
from 1815, and Rev Jas, Duncan from about 1820. Of the many 
thousands who joined the modern anti-slavery movement within 
the first twelve years after its revival at the close of the War of 
1812, these five names have been most familiar to abolitionists, 
and the two brightest are those of Lundy and Rankin. * * * In 
1822 Rev. John Rankin became pastor of the Presbyterian 
Church at Ripley, Ohio, and held the place forty-four years." 
{Jas. G. Birney and his Times, by his son, p. 1C9.) 

Rev. John Rankin died in 1880 aged ninety-three. He had 
nine sons, seven of whom fought in the I'nion army. 

FROM DR. SAMUEL CROTHERS. 

AboUtionisni in Church and ^tate. Dr. Crothers helps Dr. Bish- 
op's ^'Peacemaker". 

Greenfield, Dec. 21, 1810. 

Yours of the 15th inst. arrived this evening. I think the 
printed minutes of Synod will show that we still adhere to the 
principles of the paper laid on their table in the Fall of 1830; 
that we still do not acknowledge either the Assembly or Synod 
as constitutional judicatories of the Presbyterian Church ; and 
should any one have taken occasion to say that we have changed 
our own opinions as to exscinding acts, I doubt whether any 
protest unitedly presented or recorded on their minutes would 
have saved us from misrepresentation. It was well known by 
those who were present that we stated distinctly that we should 
feel ourselves bound to oppose and protest against any attempt 
to carry out the principles of these acts. The truth is, we did 
not consider anything besides the resolution adopted by Synod, 
necessary to satisfy brethren of both parties, and the world 
too, that we adhere to the principles expressed in (onventions; 
nor does it appear to me yet that anything more was necessary. 

I consider it a matter which calls for thankfulness that we 
took the course which we did take, and that it has resulted as it 
has. Our churches in this Presbytery are saved. I see no dis- 
satisfaction in a single instance. And Brother Woodrow must 
abandon the hope of thriving on our expulsion. 

I fully agree with you as to the wickedness of the present 
division, and our obligations to improve any opportunity of a 
reunion. But I confess I do not see what can be done im- 
mediately. I consider myself bound to avoid unnecessarily 
arousing the jealousy or wounding the feelings of our Old School 
brethren. And it appears to me that our New School friends are 
not yet in a mood to meet our advances. Nothing has more dis- 

20 



couraged me from that quarter than the manner in which the 
Presbytery of Ripley replied to our proposal, a year ago, for a 
joint committee to suggest regulations for i)romoting harmony 
and co-operation of the two Presbyteries. Their reply was in- 
sulting. Among other things they assigned as a reason for re- 
fusal that they did not know what we were going to be, etc. 

I wish we could sustain the Peace-Maker another year, but 
I despair of it. I suppose it has already been a losing concern 
to the publishers, and I fear it would be no better during 
another year. If you are all of the opinion that it can be sus- 
tained, I shall do what I can ; but I do not say how much that 
would be. I was both disappointed and mortified that we did 
so little for the present volume, in this region. 

As to the new President I have no fears. The New School 
Assembly, in 1836, in their address to the Churches, said that 
the Presbyterian Church was doing very well until (horresco 
referens) Associate Reform ministers were admitted to our 
communion, having Dr. Junkin in their eye. And I think be 
fore another year. Dr. J. L. Wilson will be of the same opinion. 
I have more hope of Dr. Wilson than any of them. With all 
his faults he is above-board, and I am mor(3 of the opinion than 
ever that he is an honest man. 

I believe that if we can do anything about slavery, it will 
be done in the Old School body. The other is hopeless — their 
course is despicable. 

I now ask you to prepare something on the subject for 
next fall. I hope you will not suspect that I am possessed of 
that unclean spirit, a disposition to flatter, when I say I think 
you are the one wiio should do it. I believe that sin of slavery 
is at the bottom of all our difficulties; and 1 also believe that 
subject is likely to bring us together. 

Dr. Crothers was. perhaps, first in oMUty, courage and service 
of early Ohio Preshyterian aholitionists. ^T<etcli of life and 
publications, and influence. ''To separate from the church 
while we are permitted to thinl-, and to speak, and to act, is 
schism." 

Note. Rev. Dr. Samuel Crothers, born in Pennsylvania 
about 1782, was of Scotch-Irish descent, his grandmother having 
lost both her parents in the siege of Londenderry. His father 
served in the army of the Revolution, and afterward emigrated 
to Kentucky. There young Crothers attended the I^xington 
Academy, and afterward received his theological training under 
Rev. Dr. John M. Mason in New York City. After teaching in 
Winchester, Ky., he became the pastor of the Presbyterian 
church at Greenfield, O., in the Chillicothe Presbytery, and re- 

21 



mained its pastor till his death in 1856; a period of thirty six 
years. His son is now pastor of the same church. 

Respected and revered as one of the fathers in the church 
when Thomas E. Thomas entered the ministry ; of great strength 
and simplicity of character, courage, piety and zeal, he exercised 
a wide influence in the early days of Presbyterianism in Ohio. 
His early prominence and distinguished service in the Anti- 
Slavery cause, merit the highest honor. It has been said that 
"Dr. Crothers was one of the fathers of Anti-Slavery literature." 
Between 1827 and 1881, he published fifteen letters in the Cin- 
cinnati Journal; being "An Appeal to Patriots and Christians, 
on behalf of the Enslaved Africans''. In 1833, he organized in 
Greenfield "The Abolition Society of Paint Valley." In 1835, 
he wrote with quaint vigor, letters which were largely read, in 
answer to Dr. Young, President of Centre College, and to Dr. 
Hodge of Princeton, both of whom published articles in extenua- 
tion, if not in defense of slavery. He was the first, and perhaps 
the ablest of the ministers in the Presbyterian Church who made 
the fight against slavery within church bounds, and as a moral 
question alone, with righteous indignation against such as de- 
fended its iniquities -on Biblical authority. His influence was 
I)otent with Drs. R. H. Bishop and Jno. W. Scott of Miami Uni- 
versity, in preventing a dismemberment of the church in the 
West on the slavery question. Men like Rev. John Rankin left 
the Presbyterian Church organization because of its pro-slavery 
attitude. No one can read the records of the church on this 
subject without realizing what a comfort it would have been to 
the friends of slavery, if Dr. Crothers and the like of him could 
have been induced to leave the church and go ofl' by themselves. 
"We will not", wrote Dr. Crothers, "be guilty of the sin of 
schism; separating from the Church of (.'hrist, while we are per- 
mitted to think, and to speak, and to act, is schism." ]Morv« 
truth cannot be put into fewer words. The people took hold of 
this idea in a political way, later on. 

Perhaps some of the best of Dr. Crothers' writing on slavery, 
appears on the minutes of the Chillicothe Presbytery; the his- 
tory of which has lately been published. * Because of their 
length, and being now accessible in print, selections from these 
admirable articles are not inserted here. In his "Life of Jas. 0. 
Birney," Gen. Birney, his son states that the sermons of Dr. 
Crothers on the subject of slavery have not been preserved. My 
father preserved them; and I have them in his library of "Anti 
Slavery Papers". Of these sermons, perhaps as memorable as any 
were : 

* ("The Hist, of Chillicothe Presbytery, from its organization in 1700 
to 1889, prepared in accordance with tlie order of I'resbytery. by Rev. 
U. C. Galbraith. D. D. : Pub. by II. W. Guthrie. Hugh Bell and Peter Plat- 
ter, Com. of Publication, Chillicothe. O. Scioto Gazette Book Office. 1889). 

22 



1. "The Gospel of the Jubilee, an explanation of the typical privi- 
leges secured to the congregation and pious strangers, by the atonement 
on the morning of the Jubilee. Lev. 25 : 9, 46 ; by Samuel Crothers. Pastor 
of the Presbyterian Church in Greenfield, Highland Co., O. Printed by J. 
M. Walters, Hamilton, O., 1837." 

2. "The Gospel of Typical Servitude, the substance of a sermon 
preached in Greenfield, Jan'y. 1. 1834, by Samuel Crothers. Published by 
the Abolition Society of Paint Valley, Hamilton, O.. 1835". 

3. "Strictures on African Slavery by Samuel Crothers. Published 
by the Abolition Society of Paint Valley, 1835." 

As showing the style of Dr. Crothers, we quote from the 
above all that space will here permit: 

"In 1. Tim. 0:2. the phrase believing despots (masters) is used in 
reference to the moment of their conversion to express at once their past 
and present character. Some infer that they continued despots. But 
James tells us how Rahab, the harlot, vpas justified. Did she continue a 
harlot?" 

"Why are all civilized nations rising up and declaring as one man 
that those outlaws engaged in the slave trade shall die the death? That 
man must be hackneyed in deceit, and expert at out-witting bis con- 
science, who while he admits that making property of human beings on 
the coast of Africa ought to be punished with death, contends for it 
as a Christian employment on his own farm. We admit that one is a 
more hazardous employment than the other ; and this is the sum of 
the difference. It requires courage to bolt into an African village at 
midnight, and in the presence of those fierce warriors, who sleep with 
their spears at their pillows, seize their little ones and hurry them to 
the slave ship. But the most timid man can step into an out-cabin and 
in the presence of parents who are in chains, seize their infant as it 
sleeps in their cradle. Can a Christian hesitate in pronouncing on such 
■ conduct? Does not nature itself teach you that it is a shame?" (pp 9- 
10. The Gospel of the Tijinea] Servitude.) * * * * 

"Our churches are defiled with this sin and must be cleansed. That 
loathsome carcass, slaveholding, has been lying in the church for more 
than three hundred years. In the eyes of many it is a pest to the 
churches' sacred furniture. There are hundreds and thousands of pro- 
fessed Christians who will not permit it to be removed or disturbed. 
An attempt to sell the ark of the covenant would not have produced 
greater convulsions in Israel, than an attempt to remove slavery from 
some of our churches. Every person and every vessel is polluted. Many 
of our members and ministers have grown gray in this sin. Some of them 
have acquired splendid fortunes by buying and selling the members 
of the Saviour's mystical body. If our children in sabbath .schools and 
theological seminaries use some of the popular helps for understanding 
the word of God, they must believe that Abraham was a thief; that 
the Old Testament church was a den of licensed manstealers; that many 
of the .statutes given at Mt. Sinai, instead of being the shadows of good 
things to come, were intended to encourage and regulate the slave- 
trade; and that the traffic in bodies and souls which the best and worst 
of men execrate as sinful in principle and ruinous in results, is a 
divine institution." (p. 19 Gospel of Typical Sercitude.) 

"The importance of understanding the various means of grace which 
God has. at different times, appohited in his church, is generally ad- 
mitted; but we have an additional inducement to study carefully the 
ordinance of the Jubilee. It has long been shamefully misrepresented 
and abused. For centuries it has been proclaimed from the pulpit and 
the press as a divine license for the slave trade, and a system of slavery 
which, for injustice and cruelty, has no parallel in the history of the 

23 



world. It was long quoted in justification of the slave-making wars 
which for ages, desolated Africa. It was used as a passport for those 
slavers whose trade all nations are now pronouncing piracy. It is still 
in the mouth of every slaveholder for the sake of gain. It has been 
used by all descriptions of men, in all departments of the slavemaking 
concern. Over fields strewed with the dead bodies of innocent Africans, 
who had fallen in defense of their wives and children ; over slaughtered 
villages; on the slave farm, and in the slave ship, amidst all the hor- 
rors of the middle passage ; in the grog-shop, and in the house of God ; 
at the gaming board, and at the Lord's table ; in health, and in the 
solemn hour of death ; it has quieted the consciences of men-stealers, 
and those who turn aside the stranger from his rights under the most 
fearful denunciations of the wrath of God." * * * * 

10. "If buying servants of the Heathen means stripping them of 
their freedom and holding them as slaves, the same phrase must be under- 
stood in the same way, throughout the chapter. It would seem then 
that not only had Israelites a divine license for converting Gentiles 
into property ; but the Gentiles had the same license in regard to Israel- 
ites (see verse 47), and the younger brethren the same as regarded 
their elder brother when he waxed poor — verse 39. Hence we have a 
statute which nullifies all the allegations imposed by the Sinai cove- 
nant on Jews and Gentiles to love one another when poor and fallen 
into decay. The command to relieve him, yea though he be a stranger, 
or a sojourner, that he may live with thee, wjj.s scarcely uttered by the 
Almighty, when it was displaced by a sweeping permission to treat 
each other as pirates ! The direct tendency of this statute thus inter- 
preted would be to make the Holy Land one of those dens of violence 
and cruelty, into which no poor man, unless he was able to whip every 
man he met with, would even dare to set his foot. And the fair appli- 
cation of it would be this. — the Scriptures allow us to enslave the 
African stranger when he waxes poor, and it allows the free African 
to enslave us when we wax poor, and he waxes rich. This would produce 
rare work in some neighborhoods." (p. 6.5 The Gospel of the Jubilee). 

Dr. Crothers was the father of eleven children. During his 
long ministr}', six hundred and eighty three communicants were 
added to his church ; and fifteen to twenty students went to him 
to get their theological- education, among whom was Hugh S. 
Fullerton. He died suddenly of apoplexy while on a visit to his 
eldest son at Oswego, 111. A few days later, his body was 
buried at Greenfield, "with the lamentations of a great multi- 
tude of his congregation and neighborhood." — A. A. T. 

FROM REV. DR. SAMUEL STEELE. 
Criticisms of anti-slnrcry methods. 

Hillsboro, O., Jan'y. 22nd. 1841. 
Dear brother : 

Your fraternal epistle has been read and pondered attentively. It 
is a fact that our anti-slavery press has got so far into the whirliwol of 
political action that other influences are well nigh overlooked ; and 
perhaps the plan which you suggest is as good as any other to enable 
us as Christians, and ministers of the gospel, to discharge our duty to 
God and our fellow creatures, on the subject of slavery. To unite with 
the brethren whom you name, in this effort, would give me much 
pleasure ; and let me suggest that it may be best not to form any organized 

24 



society ; for these have become so numerous in late years as to excite the 
derision of some and to lead others to think that nothing can be done 
that is good without them. We see each other frequently in our respective 
neighborhoods, as well as at Presbytery, and once a year we hope to 
meet in Synod. Besides, if anything of importance demanded it, we 
could have a meeting at any time without such organization. 

There should be one person to take charge of the matter, who would 
see to the printing, correcting the proof sheets, etc., and you are the 
very person. Perhaps, too. the publication could be issued from the 
press at Hamilton on as good terms as in Cincinnati. 

I will take this opportunity to give my opinion as to the spirit 
in which the essays should be writted. If in a Christian style, 
without opprobrious and abusive epithets. I am not without hope 
that we can have access to the Southern mind to some considerable 
extent But if we/ copv the violence of certain persons who shall be 
nameless, and indulge lavishly in such epithets as, man-stealers, villians, 
murderers, and the like, we will not only spoil our own tempers, but 
defeat our object. That there are slaveholders of this character cannot 
he doubted, but such are not likely to meet with our productions. And 
while there is manifestly a different class of them, among whom are 
found, in my opinion, truly pious persons,— the only class that we are 
likely to influence at present— so soon as a crusade of this description 
is preached, my name shall be withdrawn. If moral, persuasive, and 
religious influence will not move them, we must leave them to God's 
providential dealings, which may come, I fear, in the way of vengeance. 
The human mind when heated with any subiect is prone to extremes. 
I have heard brethren say they would as soon commune with a horse- 
thief, as with a slaveholder; a declaration, in my opinion, evincing a 
state of mind that unfits a man for the proper discharge of his duty 
to his erring brethren. 

I go not to the Columbus Convention, for various reasons: one is, 
that it was intended by many to be a place for political movements,— 
such as taking up a candidate for Governor, etc. Those who feel free 
to engage in such meetings, may do it without incurring my censure; 
but I prefer staying away. 

Some notice of your Presbyterial difliculties appeared in the Chris- 
tian Observer. I hoped that a course of this kind would have been 
adopted, viz ; to refer in general terms to the amicable settlement be- 
tween the Synod and Chillicothe Presbytery, and then resolve the Pres- 
bytery approve of that settlement: and are willing to terminate their 
own difficulties on the same principles. Would not this have been agree- 
able to all? Our Presbytery has acted with us in good faith, having 
cordially nominated a commissioner to the General Assembly. 

Present me fraternally to the Oxford brethren when you see them. 

Dr. Steclc/s life and influence. "A man greatly beloved and 
greatly loving". 

Note, Kev, t^amuel Steele, D. D„ son of James and Ann 
(Smith) Steele, was born in the City of Londonderry, Ireland, 
in 1796. He had his early training in a classical school taught 
by Rev, Jno, Alexander of the Covenanter Chnrcb. He landed in 
this country in 1816; studied with his brother, a minister near 
Philadelphia, attended Princeton Seminary ; was for a time pri- 
vate tutor at White Sulphur Springs, Va, ; was licensed to preach 
in 1825, at Winchester, Ky,, and preached for a time there and 



at Richmond, Ky. After acting a time as agent for the Board 
of Education, in the \Yest, in May, 1835, he was installed as pas- 
tor of the Presbyterian Church at Hillsborough, O., and so con- 
tinued for the next thirty-five years, and until his death in 1869. 
Dr. Galbraith, in his history of Chillicothe Presbytery, says 
Dr. Steele was ''a man greatly beloved and greatly loving;" one 
of those who, holding long pastorates and being men of grace, 
culture and natural ability, gave character to and made the 
Presbytery of C'hillicothe. At Hillsborough, he built up a large 
congregation, held them together as long as he lived, and when 
he died was greatly missed, and sincerely mourned. He was as 
unlike Dr. Crothers as two men could be; although they were the 
warmest friends. Dr. Crothers did the fighting: Dr. Steele 
was the beloved physician, pouring balm upon the wounded, and 
often, indeed, preventing a fight." — A. A. T. 

FROM HIS MOTFIER. 

She thinks ''There must he a sifting time." ''God's judgments 
have heen lingering." "The cry of the poor hlacls and In 
dians has long gone up to His throne." 

My Dear Son : Franklin, O. June 7th, 18.39. 

Your account of the Lord's doings at Oxford rejoiced my heart, and 
reminded me very much of the camp-meeting held there in '31. Oh! that 
the work may continue until many more souls shall be gathered in. I have 
been anxiously looking for a letter all this week to hear the closing of 
that meeting and the termination of the Conservative Convention ; do let 
me know for I feel anxious. I believe this to be a very critical time 
with the pious people in America. I cannot prophesy what the Lord is 
going to bring about but there certainly must be a sifting time : God's 
judgments have been lingering, but certainly He is a God that will punish 
the guilty, and the cry of the poor blacks and Indians has long gone 
up before His throne for vengeance. My ear has been pained to hear 
the excuses and pleas made for slavery by good men ; and now. if the 
anti-slavery men will lay the subject by as the pro-slavery men have done 
for years, what may we expect? Why exactly what has been the case 
with them as one said in the Assembly, after thirteen years laying it 
aside they will preach to the world that it is not a sin and is justified by 
the Bible, or Confession of Faith, or something.— for nowadays Confes- 
sion of Faiths are our text-book, at least in Franklin ; and last Sabbath 
we had a sermon as I do not wish to hear again from the decrees of 
God in the Confession of Faith. I was taken by guile. Mr. H. has 
been preaching from the Confession of Faith many Sabbath evenings, and 
I believe preached nearly all his congregation away, so much so that last 
Sabbath morning he told them it was an important subject and he should 
discuss it in the morning. I had hard times to keep my seat, my temper, 
and my tongue. I trembled every inch, and thought if I once got out 
of there, I should not get in again in a hurry, indeed I am tired of the 
Franklin Church. Wednesday evening, about twelve people, one man to 
pray and none to sing, and half that small congi-egation asleep! not so 
with the Methodists. Last night I went to their prayer meeting; per- 
haps eighty or ninety people, five or six engaged in prayer in the most 
lively, interesting manner; some old Christians that appeared on the 
threshold of eternity, and as if they had a glimpse of the heavenly 
Jerusalem. Others, young converts just brought in, appeared in earnest, 

26 



thanking God that they were plucked as brands from the everhisting 
burning; and their only desire seemed to be to save souls. This cer- 
tainly leaves a soul in a better state than a long discussion to prove 
that they are in error. I know not what to do. I am not an Arminian, and 
yet I am sure my soul and tlie souls of my children get more good by 
one meeting among the Methodists than from ten among the Presby- 
terians. Mr. H. has put off to Kentucky, and some of his people are 
wishing he may be taken poorly, or as Dr. Thomas used to say. com- 
fortably sick, and stop there awhile. ' * 
With Christian love to all the Hamilton friends, 

I am, Yr. affectionate Mother, 

E. R. Thomas. 

FROM DAVID H. BRUEN. ESQ..* A C'LASSMATE AT OXFORD. 

Anti-slavery mohs, and abuse of colored men at Dayton, Ohio; 
the story told by Mr. Bruen, then a lawyer there. 

Friend Thomas: Dayton, Jan v. 27, 1841.. 

Knowing that you feel a deep interest in the anti-shivery 
cause, I send you the following circumstances connected with 
its history in this place. 

On Saturday last the (Uncinnati delegates arrived here from 
Columbus, and quite late in the afternoon; the court house being 
obtained for that purpose, handbills were posted up through 
the town giving notice that Ex-Senator Morris would deliver a 
lecture there that evening, without naming the subject upon 
which he would speak. At dark, the house being lighted and 
fires made, Mr. Morris and several of the friends of the cause 
came in, and soon after the room was filled to overflowing by as 
rough a looking set of men as I ever saw. Mr. Morris seeing 
their complexion and evident purpose, at once told his friends he 
would not attempt to make an address unless he was requested 
to do so by the meeting. One of their leaders just then entered 
the Judge's stand and commenced reading a series of resolutions, 
such as a mob only would dictate, denouncing abolition and any 
attempt Mr. Morris might make to lecture on that subject; while 
another of their number stood upon the clerk's desk cursing and 
swearing and shaking his fists and calling for that d — d scoun- 
drel that had come there to make a disturbance. The original 
object of the meeting was, of course, impracticable; and Mr. Mor- 
ris being unknown by the mobiles, retired unmolested. The 
whole scene in the Court House was one of indescribable con- 
fusion, disgraceful to the character of our flourishing town. They 
called upon many of the friends of the slave to make speeches; 
but were particularly clamorous for Morris; their language and 
manner indicating the usage he would have received at their 
.hand. Baffled there, they adjourned to a coffee house opposite 

* David H. Bruen, Esq.. of Miami ',34. died 1853. He was a brother 
of Maj. Luther B. Bruen, killed in the Wilderness. 

27 



Dr. Jewett's, and after consultation, determined to make a bon- 
fire of a car belonging to the delegates who stopped with the 
Doctor. Getting wind of this, the delegates proceeded to har- 
ness their horses and remove it, and just as the driver was ready 
to mount the seat, the mob came upon them, throwing a shower 
of brickbats and knocked down the driver; the horses becoming 
frightened, started and drew the wheels of the car over the 
driver, ran off, and an hour after were overtaken a mile or so 
from the towm. They also egged Jewett's house this night. The 
mob soon after dispersed. 

The next day, being Sabbath, applications were made to some 
of the churches for some of the delegates who were ministers 
to occupy their pulpits; but the applications were refused in all 
save the Baptist Church. At the monthly anti-slavery prayer 
meeting in December, it was resolved that an attempt should be 
made to have notices of the next meeting read in the churches. 
Accordingly they were placed in the different pulpits, and read 
out in but tw^o — the New School and the Methodist ; in the latter 
it happened thus, a blind man preached, and at the conclusion 
requested a local preacher, a member of the Anti-Slavery Society 
to read the appointments; he did so, and read the above notice 
with the rest. Well, this announcement kindled the ire of the 
mob afresh, and they considered themselves insulted. They said 
it was defiance and decreed the prayer meeting should not be 
held. All day Monday, the previous occurrences and meeting at 
night were under lively discussion among the citizens. It 
seemed a settled point that Jewett's house, the place of meeting, 
would be razed to the ground, and all who attended in danger 
of their lives. It so happened, however, that through the active 
vigilance of the Mayor and his assistants, the members made 
their way through crowds of the mob; held a most interesting 
meeting, and retired at 9 o'clock unmolested, save by the hideous 
yells of the mob. Unfortunately the Mayor also soon after re- 
tired ; then the fury of the demons of darkness began and only 
became partially relieved by hearing volleys of stones and other 
missiles thrown at the Doctor's windows and against his doors; 
and also by battering to pieces the house in which a poor colored 
man resided close by. After this ceased, a portion of them 
(seven) went to a negro house in the suburbs of the town; 
broke open the door, pretended to be in search of a white woman 
of loose character, and got into a quarrel with four negro men. 
The encounter must have been a desperate one, for after a long 
struggle, the whites were driven off, leaving one of their number 
dead upon the ground, and one or two others considerably 
wounded. You may imagine the excitement with which our town 
was filled all day Tuesday: the mob filled the streets all day; 
blood, blood, was all the cry. The negroes deserted their houses 
and scattered. Abolition houses were threatened; neighbor was 

28 



warning neighbor, and in the afternoon the last finish was given 
by circulating invitations to the funeral of a man "murdered 
by a negro". The Town Council met; strengthened the police; 
issued proclamation to all good citizens, etc., and this, with the 
commitment to jail of three or four negroes, had a tendency to 
allay excitement. The police prevented anything from being 
done, except the burning of one negro hut. 

FROM THE ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY OF DAYTON. 

Dayton Committee asks T. E. Tlwmas to speak on slavery in 
Dayton. 

From the Anti-Slavery Society of Dayton. 

Dayton, O., April 8, 1841. 
Dear Sir: 

At the last meeting of the Anti-Slavery Society of this place, 
the undersigned were appointed a committee to address you to 
procure your consent to deliver a public anti-slavery lecture or 
speech here, sometime during the present or succeeding month. 
The committee believes no more powerful plea can be urged for 
your compliance with the wishes of the Society, than that it is 
Dayton, hcnighted Dayton, asks your aid. The recent mobs here 
have, in their own way, contributed much to the advancement of 
anti-slavery principles. The published charge of Judge Helfen- 
stein to the grand jury has had a salutary effect upon public 
opinion, and the members of the Society and other friends of the 
slave have labored with renewed energy and flattering prospects: 
the auspicious time seems to have arrived when another public 
effort should be made to establish free discussion upon a firm 
basis in this city, and thereby make it accessible to anti-slavery 
lectures. 

D. H. Bruen, 
S. Dunham, 
Committee. 

TO HON. CHARLES ANDERSON, MAYOR OF DAYTON, OHIO. 

Seeks to -kno^r if tJiere is freedom of speech in Dayton. 

Rossville, May 29, 1841. 
My dear Sir: In the Dayton Transcript of this day, I find 
an article headed "Abolitionism Again," respecting an address 
which I have been invited to deliver in your town. I say invited, 
for the statement that ''a person calling himself Rev. T. E. Thom- 
as appoints" etc., is altogether incorrect. Several respectable 
gentlemen of your place, as a committee in behalf of the Anti- 
Slavery Society of Dayton, requested me some time since, to 

29 



address them on the subject of slavery. This I agreed to do, 
supposing that the principal difficulty would be to procure an 
audience. The manifest design of the article above referred to, 
is to raise another riot and cause a repetition of the unhappy 
and disgraceful scenes of last Spring. 1 see, too, that a petition 
is to be addressed to the Mayor and Council (I believe you have 
the honor to be the Mayor,) requesting you "to prohibit the 
public promulgation of Anti-^Slavcn/ sentiments among you!" 
that is, to destroy, so far as Dayton is concerned, that invaluable 
privilege secured by the constitution of our country, freedom of 
speech. Remembering the friendly relations which have hitherto 
subsisted between us, (and 1 trust will continue,) 1 hastily drop 
you these few lines, requesting by return mail your views of the 
course likely to be adopted by the authorities of Dayton, respect- 
ing the proposed meeting, if indeed, they deem it ])roper to adopt 
any. 

Our view^s doubtless vary with respect to the slavery ques- 
tion ; but I feel confident that should you or the Editor of the 
Transcript, fiery as he appears to be, listen to the sentiments I 
should advance on the subject you would find them by no means 
so disorganized as he imagines. The question, however, is simply 
this. Do the laws and constitution of Ohio maintain their wonted 
dignity in the town of Dayton? 

Respectfully yours, 

T. E. Thomas. 

JOHN THOMSON AND HIS SONS. 

Note. Mr. A. Thomson, now Treasurer of Wabash College, 
and in 1833 roommate of T. E. Thomas while students in Miami 
University, writes as follows: 

Crawfordsville. Ind.. May 15. 1891. 

Dear Sir: My father, John Thomson, was horn in 1782. in Westmor- 
land County, Pennsylvania ; and he died in 1859 at Crawfordsville. aged 
86 years. Father was licensed to preach in Kentucky, and came to Ohio 
in 1801. Settling in Hamilton County, he loi-ated at Springdale (then 
called Springfield), as pastor of the Preshyterian Church, and so remained 
until 1832, when he removed to Crawfordsville. It was during the period 
along about 1820 to 18.30, I think, that your grandfather and my father 
did so much missionary work together. My brothers. James. John S., 
William M., and Samuel S.. were ministers. James came to Crawfords- 
ville in 1827, and took charge of the Presbyterian Church, and was pastor 
of the same until 18.38, when he became the pastor of the Center Church, 
and so remained until 1844. John S., was elected Professor of Mathematics 
in Wabash College in 1834, and continued such till his death in 1843. Samuel 
S., was Professor of Latin in Wabash from 184<! until his death in 1885. 
Wm. M., was born in 180<1 at Springdale, O.. and left this country as a 
missionary to Palestine in 18.32 : he is now living in Denver, Colo." 

Rev. Dr. William McClure Thomson, who graduated at Miami Univer- 
sity in 1828, remained about forty years in Palestine, and became well 
known in Europe and America as an accepted authority in the department 

30 



of archaeological research of the Holy Laud, and as author of "The Land 
and The Book." 

FROM DR. JOS. F. TUTTLE, IN "THE CHURCH AT HOME AND 

ABROAD. 

Who founded Wabash College? One result of the Oxford 
Mission Band's '^failure." 

"Wabash College originated in home missions. The father of the 
thought was Rev. James Thomson, who, when an undergraduate at Miami 
University, told President Bishop of his purpose to found a college some- 
where in the Wabash country. In 1827 he became the first pastor of the 
Presbyterian Church at Crawfordsville. an infant town on Sugar Creek, 
a tributary of the Wabash. His original purpose was not forgotten, and 
it was frequently discussed with the few home missionaries occupying the 
field. They were known as "the College Brotherhood" from their interest 
in a college which existed only in their hearts. It included James Thom- 
son, his brother. John S., Jas. A. Carnahan, Edmund O. Hovey, Martin 
M. Post and Samuel G. Lowry — all young men in the active ministry. 
With them were associated the Elders of the Crawfordsville church, espec- 
ially one who previously had been prominent in founding Hanover College. 
I refer to Williamson Dunn, a native of Kentucky, for several years a 
resident at Hanover. Indiana, and an Elder in that church. He came to 
Crawfordsville in 1823 as register of deeds of the land offic-e, and in 1829 
he returned to Hanover. He was a noble Christian man. giving to Hanover 
College in 1825, the land on which to erect its first building, and in 1832 
to Wabash College its original site." 

FROM GAMALIEL BAILEY, M. D. 

Suggestions for the meeting of the Ohio Anti-Slavery men. 

Mr. Bayle: ., , , , , i. 

Read this letter, and please hand It to Thomas if he should be 
there; or, if not, to Theo. D. Weld. 

Cincinnati, Jany. 11, 1841. 
Rev. T. E. Thomas, 
Dear Friend : 

I may not be present at the convention at Columbus, and as you 
will be a leader there, let me suggest a few things to your special 
attention. 

1. You and Bayle, Weld and Butts, Barber and Guthrie, if he 
be there, and Blanchard and White ought to arrange the preliminaries 
of the meeting. 

2. The call ought by all means to be read by the one who calls 
the meeting to order. It will be found in the Philanthropist of Decem- 
ber IGth, which I send you by this mail. It embraces all persons, whether 
members of anti-slavery societies or not, who believe in the doctrine of 
immediate emancipation, and are opposed to voting for pro-slavery can- 
didates for office. 

3. You ought to have half a dozen or more Vice Presidents, to give 
the convention an important appearance. 

4. Be sure and appoint first rate, careful scribes. No matter how 
really interesting a meeting may be. unless your secretaries be excellent, 
it will look meagre and flat on paper. I have always had to write the 
minutes out myself. 

31 



5. Purdy will probably be there. He is an amiable man, but will 
make you trouble unless you give him some office. Make him a Vice 
President. 

6. I wrote to Leicester King, requesting his presence. I guess he 
will not be there. General Paine of Painesville will be the next best 
man for the chair, I think. 

7. For the sake of everything precious in our cause, make no question 
about woman's rights. Several of our Quaker friends will be there with 
their wives, mothers, etc. By all means admit them all as delegates, if 
they apply. Let their names be enrolled without question. There is. just 
now a great deal of jealousy on this point, owing to eastern quarrels. 
There need be none. We have always left the whole question to the 
good sense of the women. Let the same course be pursued in the con- 
vention. 

8. As regards opening the meetings with prayer, there is a slight 
difficulty, easy to overcome. The Quakers, — you know their customs. 
Many of them, among the rest, Joseph Dugdale, a most amiable and 
influential man in his seat, will be present. They have been constantly 
censured by their brethren, for joining with others in this enterprise, and 
violating their consciences. Let us save them as much as we can ; re- 
spect their consciences without violating our own. Instead of the 
chairman calling on some one to pray, in the opening of every meeting, 
let there be a pause; and also at the final close. Any one who chooses, 
may of course offer up a prayer voluntarily, during such a time. This 
would not offend the Quaker; only lay aside the form. You can easily 
manage all this, by previous consultation with the chairman, and having 
the matter understood among the leading members. We owe it to our 
Quaker friends. 

9. Unless you adopt a rule, restricting speakers to ten or fifteen 
minutes on any question, you can't get along. 

10. It has seemed to me that on Wednesday evening, there should 
be a regular, set address from some able speaker ; after that, discussion 
of the business of the convention ; also that Thursday A. M. there should 
be another address : and one that evening. Perhaps one or two on 
Friday morning ; of this you can best judge on the spot. You ought to 
deliver one address ; Mr. Keep and Mr. Weld another. He has written 
to me, signifying his intention to be there, and his desire to say something 
of his doings in the World's Convention. Mr. Blanchard, of course, must 
give an address. 

11. The political and financial power of slavery should be handled 
by somebody pretty thoroughly. Get Morris to do this. 

12. I do hope you will take the ground that no abolitionist ought 
to vote for a pro-slavery man ; and I hope too that yoir will recommend 
to abolitionists to adopt, as a general rule, independent nominations. 

13. Bring the subject of the Philanthropist specially before the 
meeting. Nearly all benevolent papers need extra aid. They have no 
advertising patronage to depend on. The Philanthropist has a very large 
exchange list. This is one source of great expense. A large number of 
copies is circulated gratuitously. We supply Congress, and our State 
Legislature, and should like to be able to send to the Indiana Legis- 
lature. More than 30<) papers are consumed in this way. The State 
Treasury is now very much in debt. We came near stopping the paper 
this Winter. Never was there such a field for doing good, could we 
but keep the paper on its legs. 

I have thus made all these suggestions. They may seem dicta- 
torial. They are not so. You wall of course, do with them what you 
please. I have hitherto so constantly attended all State meetings and 
have so frequently attended to all details, that I thought a few sugges- 
tions not amiss. Please excuse me. 

32 



II 

TO PROFESSOR J. W. SCOTT, OXFORD. 

On Dr. Junkin, and his opposition to anti-slavery effort at Ox- 
ford. 

Rossville, Feb. 7, 1842. 

It afforded me much pleasure, as well as some pain to receive 
your long communication last week. 

So your good congregation has resolved, by a majority of 
one, that no more abolition, as our friend, Mr. Graham, calls 
it, shall be preached in your church \ * * * * 

No, Sir,^ — I hope to preach an anti-slavery sermon yet, in 
your church, — aye, and in the very face and eyes of Dr. Junkin, 
unless he fears to meet the truth. * * * * 

A word or two as to the minority-effort to purchase the 
church. You ask whether our people would not aid you. You 
are aware that we have a debt yet unpaid upon our own church ; 
but, what would be a still more serious difficulty, your anti- 
abolition majority would still adhere to you, even after you shall 
have purchased the building. And what assurance could we 
have that freedom of ministerial speech would be tolerated? By 
the way, will you procure for me a copy of the resolutions pro 

posed and carried by Dr. J ? It is time that anti-slavery men 

should know the true principles of the man who stands at the 
head of Miami University. 

Dr. Junkin; his education. Influences that hrought about his 
presidency at Miami. Dr. Bishop brings on debate about 
slavery between T. E. Thomas and Dr. Junkin. Results of 
its publication. Dr. Junkin' s later patriotism and service. 

Note. Rev. Geo. Junkin, D. D., LL. D., was graduated at 
Jefferson College in 1813. He studied theology under Dr. Mason, 
in New York City, and, while engaged in pastoral work, after 
establishing the Milton Academy and the Penn. Manual Labor 
Academy, he became the first President of Lafayette College, at 
Easton, Pa. In the management of this institution, he was ener- 
getic and successful ; and, at the same time, he became prominent, 
active and persistent in bringing about and prosecuting those doc- 
trinal contentions, charges and "trials" which resulted in the 

33 



disruption of the Presbyterian Church into its Old and New 
School divisions. 

The influences which had brought about the removal of Dr. 
Bishop from the Presidency of Miami University by its Board 
of Trustees, induced them to call to that position Dr. Junkin : he 
accepted and entered upon his duties in April 1841. The work 
devolving upon the new President was not pleasant: probably 
no one could have performed it with satisfaction and success. 
About him rallied and exulted all to which the character and prii>- 
ciples of Dr. Bishop had ever stood opposed ; and most prominent- 
ly among these were first, the pro-slavery element; and second, 
those who held sectarian views so narrow that they were proud 
of the late dismemberment of the church. Still it seems indis- 
putable that: those who held these views constituted the bulk of 
the membership, or at least of the leadership of the Old School 
Presbyterian Church in that day. 

The biographer of Dr. Junkin has written, in explanation 
of his brother's difficulties, that "about this time abolitionism 
was at its height.-' In no proper sense can abolitionism be said 
to have reached its "height," until that night in April, 1865, 
when Grant w^rote Sheridan not to go against the Southside 
railroad, but to stay with him, for ''he felt like ending the 
matter." 

In 1843, in the Synod of Cincinnati, which met in T. E. 
Thomas' church at Hamilton, Ohio, Dr. Bishop introduced cer- 
tain resolutions against slavery that brought on the debate 
between Dr. Junkin and T. E. Thomas, which is sufficiently re- 
ferred to elsewhere in this correspondence. Its publication soon 
afterwards, seems to have given satisfaction to both parties: it 
made a longer continuance of Dr. Junkin at the head of Miami 
University impossible; but his argument in defense of slavery 
was widely circulated and commended in the Southern States. 
The pro-slavery element in the church gave him the first and 
highest reward in its power; it made him Moderator of the next 
General Assembly, which met at Louisville, Ky., in 1844. Custom 
entitled him to be returned to the next General Assembly, and 
to be chairman of its Committee On Bills and Overtures to whom 
were sent all memorials against slavery. This committee rec- 
ommended that they be sent to a special committee, of which the 
chairman was Dr." N. L. Rice. This Committee reported the 
notorious Act on Slavery of 1845, so often referred to in this 
volume. 

When the Rebellion broke out. Dr. Junkin was seventy-one 
vears old. From the beginning of the attempt to carry Virginia 
into secession, to the end of his life, all that he did merits the 
highest honor. 

In the next seven years, it is said Dr. Junkin delivered 
about seven hundred sermons, and political addresses sustaining 

34 



the cause of the ITnion and its defenders. His activity during 
this period amazed his friends. Though not a delegate, he 
attended the General Assembly at Philadelphia, in 1861; and 
warmly advocated the celebrated Spring Resolutions adopted by 
that body. In this, his conduct brought upon him the criticism 
of many, including probably his brother and biographer, whose 
Scotch-Irish proclivities inclined them to be splitting hairs about 
constitutional checks and balances, when the rebel flag was in 
sight of the National Capitol. These things could not move him, 
for the patriotism of Dr. Junkin was now *'at its height." While 
the war lasted, he was untiring in his efforts to relieve the 
suffering from both armies, in the field, the hospital and the 
prison. He was said to have been the first non-combatant on 
the field of Gettysburg on an errand of mercy. — A. A. T. 

Dr. Junkin's Synodical Speech in defense of American Slav- 
ery, was published in Dec, 1843. My father w^rote and published 
a Review^ of this, in a pamphlet of 130 pages, to which he gave 
more labor than anything that ever came from his pen. It be 
gins thus : 

"We have just received, through the politeness of the printer, a pam- 
phlet of some eighty pages, bearing the above title. Abolitionists have 
been compelled to exclaim, in the language of Job, "O that one would 
hear me! * * * and that mine adversary had written a book!" Accustomed 
to meet in deliberative, legislative, and we are sorry to add, in ecclesias- 
tical bodies, no other opponent than a silent but overwhelming vote; and 
to find all opportunity of advocating the truth cut off by the paltry trick 
of raising the qiiestion of reception, or the man-trap of the Previous Ques- 
tion, they cannot but hail it as an omen of good, and rejoice as in a sure 
pressage of final success, when the defenders of slavery are compelled to 
meet them in debate; and especially, when they are willing to stamp their 
thoughts on the enduring page. Certainly we rejoiced, (though our joy 
was mingled with regret for the mischief it would occasion,) when first 
we heard that the notorious synodical speech of the President of Miami 
University, v^as in the hands of the printer. We regard its publication as 
an important step toward the thorough and universal investigation of the 
slavery question, in the Presbyterian Church." 

There follows to this pamphlet this : 
APPENDIX. 

Just as the preceding pages were prepared for the press, we received 
the following communication from the venei'able Dr. Bishop, which, with 
the accompanying letter, we here present to the public. 
My Dear Friend : 

I make free to forward you a few of my Christmas thoughts on the 
Eight hours speech. If it is agreeable to you, and if you shall be convinced 
that it will be of any service, either to you, or the good cause, you may 
have them printed and published in the form in which they now stand, at 
the close of your full and particular reply * * * Provided we have come to 
the same result, it may be a benefit to the cause, with some minds, to s^ 
that the very same conclusions maybe obtained by a somewhat different 
arrangement, or different mode of reasoning. * * * * May the Lord bless 
and direct and supi)ort you. Sincerely yours, 

R. H, Bishop. 

Oxford, Ohio, December 26, 1843. 

35 



SUMMARY REVIP'.W 

Dr. Junkin's late pamphlet, of 70 pages, dein.iiids some attention; for — 
I. A publication of this kind must be very acceptable to the many, 
both within and without the visible chun-h. whose consciences are some- 
what awakened to the inconsistency of American slavery with Christian 
character, and Christian standing. 

II. The form in which the argument is presented, is exceedingly 
plausible ; and yet, 

III. The whole argument, from beginning to end, is deceptive: — only 
fallacy upon fallacy." 

I omit Dr. Bishop's text, giving only one paragrapli to get a 
touch of his mind on tlie subject, 

"The duties to their servants, whether believing or unbelieving, directly 
enjoinetl upon believing masters, are of such a nature, that, if they were 
punctually and faithfully performed, they would naturally abolish slavery 
in every Christian family, in less than one generation. These duties and 
directions are still enjoined and addressed, by the same authority, to every 
Christian church, and to every Christian man : and if they were under- 
stood, and honestly attended to, the results would be just what they were 
in the apostolic days." 

OVERTURE OF OXFORD PRESBYTERY TO THE GENERAL ASSEM- 
BLY ON SLAVERY. 

To the Moderator and Members of the General Assembly : 

The Presbytery of Oxford respectfully and earnestly request the 
General Assembly, at their present meeting, to adopt some course of 
action, by which the Assembly's act of 1818, relative to slavery, may be 
rendered efficient. 

March 17, 1842. 

Ayes: J. W. Scott, Moderator; A. B. Gilliland: P. N. Galliday; T. E. 
Thomas ; Wm. Patterson ; S. B. Smith ; Elders. Neri Ogden ; A. B. An- 
drews; M. C. Williams; M. C. Browning. Nayes : A. Craig; .1. McArthur ; 
T. E. Hughs. Elders, Geo. Arnold ; Thomas Dungan ; John McGahen. 
Non Liquet, D. B. Reece. 

A true extract from the minutes of Oxford Presbytery. 

Thomas F. Hughs, Stated Clerk. 

Rev. James Gilliland. Service as abolition leader in Southern 
Ohio. His son. Rev. Adam B. (liUilnnd. 

Note. Rev. James Gilliland was born in North Carolina 
in 17G9; graduated from Dickinson College, and Ijecame pastor 
of the Broadway Church in ^>outh Carolina, in 1796. Twelve 
members of his congregation protested, charging him with 
''preaching against the government:" this he denied, but admit- 
ted he had preached against the sin of slavery. The Presbytery 
enjoined him "to be silent in the pulpit on the subject." The 
Synod on appeal, held that '"to preach publicly against slavery 
would open the way to gi'eat confusion.'' To reach a land of free 
speech, he removed to Brown (^o., Ohio, in ISO.o. where he became 
and remained pastor of the Red Oak Church, and preached 
constantly against slavery for the next thirty-five years. In 
1820 he published a pamphlet on the subject that had a wide 
circulation. Gen. Birney says that ''from 1S0.5 to 1822, he was 
the recognized abolition leader in Southern Ohio.'' Abolition- 

3fi 



ists are justly deserving of rank according to their respective 
priorities of date. Rev. James Gilliland was the first Presby- 
terian minister on the roll. The Dickeys and Crothers came 
later; and Rev. John Rankin's date was 1815. 

Rev. James Gilliland died in 184.5; was the father of thir- 
teen children, two of whom were lawyers, and one a Presby- 
terian minister. 

The latter. Rev. Adam B. Gilliland, was born in North Caro- 
lina, in 1794 ; graduated at Jefferson College in 1821 ; studied 
theology with his father at Red Oak; became pastor at Hillsbor- 
ough, Ohio ; and, in 1829, took charge of Bethel Church, Butler 
Co. Ohio, w^here he remained ten years. It was at his house and 
church there, on a comnuinion occasion, that the accidental meet- 
ing between Thomas Thomas and Dr. Bishop took place, which 
gave my father his opportunity for an education. Dr. Thomas left 
the church at Harrison, O., chiefly to bring about an exchange 
which made Rev. Mr. Gilliland pastor of the Church at Venice, 
which Rev. Thomas Thomas had built, and where Mr. Gilliland 
continued for the next twenty years. He died in 1885, at the 
home of his daughter, Mrs. A. W. Anderson, in Dayton, O., and 
was buried near Thomas Thomas in the church yard at Venice, O. 

As a delegate in the General Assembly of 1845, the name of 
Adam B. Gilliland has the honor of being one of the thirteen 
recorded against the Resolution of Dr. Nathan L. Rice, assert- 
ing the Biblical sanction of slavery, adopted that year. — A. A. T. 

FROM REV. DR. SAMUEL, CROTHERS. 

Dr. Junkin in tJie slave controversy. f>haU the CJiurch divide on 

the question? 

Greenfield. Ohio. Nov. 7. 1S43. 
For some weeks past I have i)ur]tose(l to write to you in a day or 
two. but have daily, by some means or other, been prevented. I wish to 
say that the comnuniity. so far as I know public sentiment, are expecting 
you to publish, in some way or other, a review of Dr. .Tunkins speech in 
favor of the tolerated einl, slaveholding;. From the self-complacency 
manifested at Hamilton, I have supposed he will be simple enough to 
publish in pamphlet form. In that event, your speech in reply, so far 
as you can recollect it, ought by all means to follow. My principal object 
in writing now is to say that I have no intention of answering him. For 
many reasons which are obvious and which need not be dilated, the public 
will expect you to do it. Even if it should be ascertained that .Tunkin 
will not publish, I think you ought to review his speech. It could be 
circulated in pamphlet form, and distributed in the same way that "Facts 
for the People" are circulated. 

I supposed that Dr. Junkin's good opinion of his performance will be 
increased if it be true, as the Presbyterian of the West insinuates, that he 
lent it to yir. Graham, and that none of the new scliool Synod at Carlisle 
undertook to reply: and that "Professor Stowe. the best qualified to judge, 
admitted that the interpretation and principles of interpretation were cor- 
rect". I cannot think of Graham subscribing the pastoral letter written 
by J. H. Dickey against the horrible sin of slavery, and then using the ar- 
guments of Dr. Junkin against the liorrible sin of abolitionism, without 
indulging myself in old Dr. Nesbit's famous soliloquy — "poor human 
nature". 37 



I believe the discussion at Hamilton has been productive of good. I 
have heard from Cincinnati and other quarters, the opinion of men of 
the world, who were spectators, and the prevailing opinion appears to be 
that Dr. Junljin must alter his course or leave Miami University. 

We had two days of powerful lecturing by those Garrison men, 
White and Douglass, in this place, lately. Tlie latter is an extraordinary 
man. He has the talents of T. D. Weld, and the self-complacency of 
Junkin. I thinlv. upon the whole, he did much good. But I confess, I 
do not lilve to be identified with Garrison al)olitionists. I believe the 
machinery which they are employing is calculated to overturn every good 
institution, human or divine ; and the sooner it is Ivuown that they and 
we belong to schools entirely different, the better it will be for the cause 
of truth and righteousness in general, and abolition in particular. 

My mind has not undei'gone any change on the subject of our late 
correspondence. I consider secession as very unwise. But I am not sure 
that I shall not vote against sending a commissioner to the next General 
Assembly. To our vote on that question at the last meeting of our Presby- 
tery, we are indebted, in my opinion, for the fine speech at Synod by 
brother Steele. And some movement of that kind, in future, will be 
necessary to keep up the abolition steam of him and some others. Next 
week he expects to bring home a wife, the daughter of Rev. R. Stewart 
of West Lexington Presbytery, a slaveholder ; but it is said she has liber- 
ated her slaves, four in number. 

Dr. Bishop; his origin, history, poverty, clwracter, education. 
Does not "drift to Kentucky" . Goes to Lexington ; indicted 
for opening sahhath-schools for slaves. Called to Miami. 
What students could get from him. His definition of Pres 
hyterianism. Resists disruption of the church. Activity as 
an anti-slavery man, and its consequence. Removal, and de- 
fense against charges. Injury to Miami resulting. His 
death; uill; burial. 

Note. Rev. Robert Hamilton Bishop, D. D., was born about 
twenty miles from the City of Edinburgh, in Linlithgowshire, 
in 1777. He was one of a family of seventeen children. His 
father's name was William Bishop, and Robert H. was the eldest 
of thirteen children, the issue of his marriage to his second wife, 
Margaret Hamilton. His more remote ancestors were zealous 
covenanters, and suffered in the persecutions. His parents be- 
longed to the Secession Church, and had the character, piety, 
plainness and poverty of that peasantry which is the wonder 
and glory of Scotland. 

Placed, when very young, in a primary school where the 
chief books used were the Bible and the Shorter Catechism, he 
thoroughly memorized these, and they continued to be the chief 
books to him throughout his life. When twelve years old, he 
became a member of the church then under the charge of Dr. 
John Brown, a son of John Brown of Haddington, and father 
of Dr.. John Brown of Edinburgh. * The latter was his school 
and college mate and correspondent ia after years. 

* Author of Rab and His Friends. 

38 



Like the father of Thomas E. Thomas, Robert H. Bishop 
passed his early years as a shepherd boy. At the age of sixteen, 
his father sent him, with no proper preparation, to commence the 
study of Greek in Edinburgh University, but was able to pay 
his expenses there only the first session of one year. In his per- 
plexity, Robert was about to enter the King's service, either in 
the army or navy ; but, going back to Edinburgh, in 1794, to see 
if it were possible in any way to proceed with his education, he 
thus afterwards described his success: 

"What was I to do, or bow was I to be supported, I knew not. But 
having with great diffidence introduced myself to Professor Finlayson, at 
the close of one of bis introductory lectures, to ascertain from him the 
lowest terms on which he would permit me to attend his instructions, he, 
with great frankness, without enquiring who I was or whence I came, 
immediately replied, that if I were a young man worth attending to, he 
would not only admit me to his course without charge, but also secure me 
the same privilege from the other professors, during the four years' course. 
And he did so. The college sessions were only five months in the year, 
and I taught school during the Summer months ; and as an acknowledge- 
ment to the Father of mercies, for his kindness through the professors in 
Edinburgh, I admitted into my little college always one, and sometimes 
two scholars without charge". 

In after years Dr. Bishop wrote : 

"I commenced the study of political and moral science forty years 
ago, under two of the most distinguished men of their day. Professors 
Finlayson and Dugald Stuart. The former of these is scarcely known ex 
cept by his pupils ; yet as an accurate thinker, and an attentive observer 
of human nature, and as to his exciting the minds of his students to 
proper exertions, be was in no way inferior to his celebrated fellow- 
laborer who delivered his lectures to an enraptured audience in an 
adjoining room". 

While Dr. Bishop acknowledged always, and seriously felt, 
all through his life, the want of a thorough preparatory or gram- 
mar education, there is no doubt that he took from these great in- 
structors, in a high degree, not only the zeal for, but also the gift 
to impart knowledge. In the "faculty for teaching," no man of my 
acquaintance ever equaled the late William ??mith, Principal of the 
Dayton High School. Among other things he had a peculiar 
gift, hy questions alone, of inducing a pupil to first discover 
and then correct his own mistakes. This avoids, correction and 
statement by the teacher, which does not, in the words of Dr. 
Bishop, "excite the pupil's mind." This faculty, William Smith 
learned from Prof. R. H. Bishop, who got it from his father. 
Although here unable to demonstrate this claim, I always be- 
lieved the method came from Dr. Adam Smith of the Edinburgh 
High School : if so, 

"How far that little candle threw its beams". 

When twenty-two, young Bishop entered the Theological 
Hall or School of the Burgher Synod at Selkirk, on the Ettrick 

39 



River. In 1801, Rev. Dr. John M. Mason, * of New York City, 
visited the Burgher Synods of Scotland, to obtain a supply of 
preachers for the American Burgher or Associate Reformed 
Churches : and there addressed the students at Selkirk. From his 
lips, and with the liveliest interest, young Bishop heard of the 
needs and opportunities of the Western World. More than fifty 
years later, in some reminiscences. Dr. Bishop wrote: ''Some two 
"or three weeks afterwards, on returning home from the Theologic- 
al class, I stopped over one night at Edinburgh and late in the 
evening, I and another student met Dr. Mason at the crossing of 
two streets. Had either of us been two or three minutes earlier or 
later at the spot, the meeting could not have taken place. He 
invited us to his lodgings, and we passed an hour or two with 
him in conversation. From that accidental interview originated 
an engagement on my part to go to America." 

Mr. Bishop was married to Ann Ireland, at Bucklaven, on 
the Firth of Forth, and embarking immediately in company 
with Dr. Mason and five ordained ministers, he landed in New 
York in October, 1802. It was proposed he should remain in 
that city, but by the casting vote of the presiding officer in Pres- 
bytery, he was sent to Kentucky. For the next five years, 
he "itinerated as a missionary** in the Miami Valley, and 
also in portions of Kentucky. In 180'4, he was appointed 
Professor of Logic and Moral Philosophy and afterward filled the 
chair of Nautral Philosophy, and then of History in Transylvania 
University, at Lexington; and so continued for the next t\s'enty 
years, and until his resignation and removal from the State. 

That Dr. Bishop was the best instructor Transylvania ever 
had, there seems to be little doubt; nor that his character made 
a lasting impression for good upon the better class of people 
in that State. This reputation served a good purpose in drawing 
to Miami, later on. some of the best students which that institu- 
tion received. Of his earlier itinerant days. Dr. Bishop has 

written : 

"No individual conld have been more cordially received than I was 
during my eighteen months traveling: nor can any words express the satis- 
faction which I enjoyed in nearly all my social intercourse, both public 
and private. My hopes of ultimate success in being instrumental in plant- 
ing churches almost without number, and on the purest and most effi- 
cient models, were strong: and these hopes were cherished and strength- 
ened by almost every circumstance. Kentucky and the Miami Valley ap- 
peared" to me not "only the garden of America, but the garden of 
the world: and were fixed upon in my mind, not only to be filled with a 
dense population, but to be the center of influence to the future States and 
future nations of the Mississippi Valley". 

Yet in his autobiographical sketch, we have some singular 
pictures of the State of Presbyterianism in Kentucky, in those 

* Dr. Jno. M. Mason did his full share for the abolition cause in 
Southern Ohio. He educated Dr. Samuel Crothers : and he brought Dr. R. 
H. Bishop to America. — A, A. T. 

40 



pioneer days. Dr. Bishop's activities could not be confined to 
college work. Each week, and on ^^uudays, he preached to 
different churches. These were rent with divisions and conten- 
tions about the merest trifles. For four years, he himself was, 
as he says, "under ecclesiastical process."' These contentions 
seem to have driven him from the Associate Reformed into the 
Presbyterian Church. With the former, ''The Sabbath when 
thev had no preaching of their own, was a mere day of idleness, 
as it was a settled point that they could neither themselves 
attend worship, nor allow their families to attend with any who 
did not use the old version of the Psalms. Tlie greater part of 
their conversation on religious subjects, whether on the Sabbath 
or on other days, was the errors and extravagance of other de- 
nominations," ' "Almost every congregation was in a state of 
organized opposition to some neighboring Presbyterian congre- 
gation with which it had formerly been connected." To help in 
contentions at Presbytery, "Elders, properly instructed, were 
sometimes brought from Tennessee and other extremities." 

During these years he had full opportunity to see and learn 
and know what the system of American slavery meant. In those 
days, however, the bitterness of the system had not yet come 
to master or slave. The vast plantation states of the southwest 
had not then been settled; and in the drain to fill and refill 
them, the cruel separations of colored families that were to 
come, were a thing not realized, although impending. Dr. 
Bishop, on one occasion, records his horror at giving the com- 
munion, among others to a woman who was to be sold at auc- 
tion next day by another communicant. He often preached and 
labored among poor slaves, and w^as constant in his efforts to 
give them some education and religious instruction. He states 
that he "organized the first Sabbath-schools which were opened 
in Lexington for that portion of our fellow mortals." Dr. H. 
S. Fullerton, in his printed review of the Assembly's action on 
Slavery, in 1845, states that ''Dr. Bishop was more than once 
returned to the Grand Jury, for opening a Sabbath-school for 
slaves in Lexington." 

Probably no man in the West was so well fitted to be Pres- 
ident of Miami University as was Dr. Bishop when called to the 
work, in 1824. The diflflculties to be overcome had been his lot 
for twenty-five years. With the people from whom its students 
must come, he had a wide and personal acquaintance. In the 
next twenty years, and until about 1845, the good he did, and the 
impression he made upon young men in the West, can, in results. 
never be effaced. Sprague, in "Annals of the American 
Pulpit," says that "in educational work in the West, Dr. E. H. 
Bishop was the strongest individual influence of his genera- 
tion." He was followed, not immediately, but soon, by men 
who were equally devoted, and of better scholarship, but they 

41 



did not *'excite" and impress the minds of their pupils as he did, 

and as they need to be excited and impressed to get the results 

The strove for. I think no one has claimed that Miami Univer- 

' sity ever had a President equal to him. General Birney, in his 

/ ''Life and Times of James G. Birney," says, "Dr Bishop's char- 

L^acter and influence are a tradition in many families." I have 

tried to get at the secret of this influence, and am by no means 

certain that I understand it. His own mother and Dr. Bishop 

were the two influences, not conflicting, but much alike, which 

formed my father's character. For Dr. Bishop he had a mingled 

feeling of affection, respect and gratitude, which these letters 

but inadequately describe. In one of my father's letters, ho 

states that he leh Oxford with no creditable amount of scholarly 

acquisition; yet he went thence with something gained there 

which is harder to impart than scholarship. Carlyle criticised 

the genius of Sir Walter Scott, because it contained "too little 

"7 of the sacred fire that will burn up the sins of the world." Every 

' year there went forth from the tutelage of Dr. Bishop a little 

band of young men aflame with that sacred fire: no temptations, 

no discouragements, no opposition, no poverty, no time, no fate 

could quench it: it illuminates the pages of this Correspondence, 

— otherwise they cannot be read ! 

Regarding the pupils of Dr. Bishop, it must l)e remembered 
too, that they came to him, almost with no exception, without 
that proper and necessary preparation and fitting for the work 
he was expected to do. Every teacher knows what is involved 
in taking pupils without, or with uneven preparation, and trying 
to get creditable and uniform results from them when taught 
as a whole. Dr. Bishop did not get uniform results. The won- 
der has been the number of students that have reached creditable 
position, or done important work, who were in some part, under 
his instruction. The present President of the United States 
wrote to him : 

Mouth Miami, August 28, 1850. 
Dr. R. H. Bistiop, 

Having for some years enjoyed the benefits of your instruction, and 
being now about to pass from under your care, it would be truly un- 
grateful were I not to return my warmest thanks for the lively interest 
you have ever manifested in my welfare and advancement, in religious 
as well as scientific knowledge. The advancement which I have made but 
serves to show how much greater it might have been with proper diligeme 
and study. Though I shall no more take my accustomed seat in your 
class-room, I would not this separation should destroy whatever interest 
you may have felt in my welfare. Whenever you may see anything in 
ray course which you deem reprehensible, be assured that any advice which 
may suggest itself under whatever circumstances or on whatever subject, 
can never meet with other than a hearty welcome. 

Yours sincerely, 

Benjamin Harrison. 

42 



To discover bright and ambitions boys in obscurity and pov- 
erty,* to give tliem such help and encouragement that 
by frugality, they could support themselves; to gather them 
together and teach them personally for years; to imbue them 
with his own principles and doctrines, and to send them out to 
contend for these; and then watch and guide them as they 
made a way in the world,— that surely would be exquisite pleas- 
ure to any educated man. Just this was the delight, the occu- 
pation and pride of Dr. Bishop for fifty years. Who doubts 
that he had his reward? 

He is remembered as always full of praise for what was 
worthy of praise in men and things about him. It was his 
custom to deliver and publish many obituary addresses, not elab- 
orate or great, but more notable than his audiences in that day 
(or since) were accustomed to hear, which made a lasting im- 
pression on surviving friends. He loved biography not only of 
the great, but as well of those who were worthy and unknown.. 
He delivered such an address in the college chapel at Oxford, 
on the death of Rev. Thomas Thomas, as my father never forgot. 
Of Thomas Thomas he said, among other things, that ''he had a 
large library and a mind of the first order." Dr. Bishop had 
an odd way of putting things together. In an old MS. I once 
saw, he said of his own father, ''At 10:20 a. m., my father 
returned from the harvest field with a pain in his bowels, and 
at 11 : 30 he died with glory on his lips and glory on every 
feature of his countenance." 

In 1833, Dr. Bishop preached in Cincinnati and published 
a sermon entitled "A Plea for United Christian Action, ad- 
dressed particularly to Presbyterians;" and as showing his style, 
a few sentences from this address may be well quoted here: 

The term Presbyterianism is like all other isms in theology — it may 
be very well understood for all practical purposes, and yet when used in 
controversy, may be very vague and equivocal and ambiguous. Dr. Rogers 
of New York, who Is acknowledged on all hands to have been one of the 
fathers of the Presbyterian Church in North America, is said to have 
said, "That he always found it extremely difiicult to make a Scotchman 
understand what American Presbyterianism was." 

"American Presbyterianism is like our common Christianity. Its 



* I append and quote from my address in 1894. at the Steele High 
School In Dayton. 

"In vacation times, the custom of Dr. Bishop was to take long horse- 
back rides, without destination, stopping wherever people were gathered 
together. He knew what he was searching for. One night— it was 
in 1829. — in an attic bedroom of a farm house on the banks of the Miami 
River, near Jersey Church, opposite Franklin, in Warren County, he found 
my father, then an unknown boy seventeen years old. eager to learn but 
unable to proceed. I have my father's letter describing that interview. 
'My head,' he writes, 'spun like a top when Dr. Bishop at last said. 'Come, 
and I will engage in some way to find means to enable you to stay.' " 

43 



great and leading features are few. simple, and very easily understood; 
but the modifications and applications of these leading features are re- 
markably diversified. These leading features are. equality of rank among 
all her leading elders ; a regular gradation of church courts ; and an 
adherence to the doctrines of the Westminster Confession of Faith, with 
the Catechisms. Larger and Shorter, as being the system of doctrines con- 
tained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament. To these may 
be added, practically, though not theoretically, maintaining the necessity 
of a learned ministry. Wherever I find these features substantially main- 
tained. I find a Presbyterian, and a Presbyterian just such as John Knox 
was, and as the great body of the Presbyterians in Great Britain and 
Ireland have always been since the Reformation.'' 

It was the peculiar happiness of the Tennents. and the Blairs, and 
of Davies, and of Rogers, and Witherspoon, and of the other fathers of 
the General Assembly Presbyterians in North America, that they under- 
stood well the great and leading, the essential features of genuine Pres- 
byterianism ; and that they could divest these essential features of locali- 
ties, and adapt the system to the state of society which was forming in these 
now United States. The great evil under which all the other branches of 
the Presbyterian Church in America have labored, and under which they 
still labor, is an attempt to introduce into the American soil, and into an 
American state of society, the peculiarities of distant r-oimtries, and of 
remote and distant ages. And yet these peculiarities are no more essen- 
tial to Presbyterianism than they are to Christianity itself." 

Probably Dr. Bishop's position and inflnente at Oxford were 
never so assured and commanding as about the time of my 
father's graduation, in 1834 ; and to the graduates of those days, 
there then appeared in the institution, a glow of ambition, of 
industry and of devotion not so noticeable in former or after days. 
The first disturbing element was the disruption of the Presbyte- 
rian Church in 1837. Against this. Dr. Bishop set himself with 
all his power, and it seemed at one time that he must leave the 
church from his refusal to recognize or adhere to either faction. 
Later on, the stand he took, and indeed some phases of his 
character, are well disclosed by the following communication 
which we find in Dr. Bishop's hand writing, among my father's 
papers : 

To the Moderator of the Presbytery of Oxford, 

to meet at Venice on the day of March, 1845, 
or when and wheresoever said Presbytery 
may meet : 
Dear brother : 

A variety of circumstances over which I have had no control, has led 
me to believe that it is now a duty which I owe to you and to myself and 
to many others, to request of you, as I hereby do, that you will be pleased 
to give me a regular dismission from your venerable body, and if consis- 
tent with your princii)les and feelings, give me a recommendation to the 
Presbytery of Cincinnati (New School) as in good Christian and minis- 
terial standing. I make this application : 

I. Not from any change in my opinions as to any principles con- 
tained in the Westminster Confession, or in the Catechism, Larger or 
Shorter, or in the form of Presbyterial Government as expressed in the 
Constitution of the Presbyterian Church in these United States. 

II. Nor have I any dissatisfaction with any of the modes of ecclesias- 
tical operation, through the Education, or Publishing, or Domestic or 

44 



Foreign Missionary Boards of tlie Assembly. Ou tlie contrary, I sincerely 
and truly desire tliat every minister and elder and every member in tlie 
Connection would duly appreciate all the arrangements connected with 
these Boards, and act in all cases with Christian vigor and faithfulness 
in carrying out these objects. 

III. Much less have I any dissatisfaction, either personal or official, 
with any of the members of the Presbytery of Oxford. I only lament that 
I have done so little in the great and good work in which they are 
engaged. I cheerfully recognize them as beloved and faithful brethren 
in our Lord Jesus Christ, and heartily sympathize with them in all their 
labors and difficulties and sorrows ; and hope that each of them will in 
due time know fully the import of the declaration : "He that goeth forth 
and weepeth, bearing precious seed, shall doubtless come again with 
rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him". 

My reasons for the present application, if I know Hiyself. are simply 
and only these : 

I. It is well known to all the brethren, that I have always con- 
sidered the division of the Presbyterian Church, which took place in 
1837, as not only unnecessary, but sinful. 

II. It is equally well known that that division has never affected me 
personally ; and that I have ever since, and up to this very hour, enjoyed 
the Christian and ministerial and ecclesiastical communion of the brethren 
and churches and courts of each division, as fully and freely and com- 
fortably as ever I did before the division took place. 

III. My time of sojourning and service here, cannot in the nature of 
things be much longer. I must work while it is day. I have a strong 
desire, therefore, in this way. to give my public and likely my dying 
testimony to my honest belief and experience that the Presbyterian Church 
in these United States, though ecclesiastically in two general divisions, is 
in fact still only ONE body, and one of the departments of the Army of 
our Lord Jesus Christ. 

I wish to follow our departed brother Craig (whose funeral I at- 
tended on the last Sabbath of June last) into the General Assembly and 
Church of the Fii-st Born, hand-in-hand with brother Beecher ; and I 
hope that brother Wilson will, (only a few steps behind or before), 
hand-in-hand with some other brother of the New School Connection, take 
his place in the same happy company. 

All of which is respectfully submitted, 

R. H. Bishop. 

While it was true that the division in the church "never 
affected Dr. Bishop personally," his serious and unremitting 
opposition to it did affect his hold on the community, — such was 
the bitterness of the times, — over a question so trifling that we 
have difficulty in getting any intelligent Presbyterian of to-day 
to plainly say or admit what the difference or cause of sepa- 
ration was. Still, all this could not have affected the hold of 
Dr. Bishop at Oxford, had there not been added his zeal and 
activity in the Anti-Slavery cause, into which he cast his whole 
weight. His determination was to compel the Presbyterian 
Church to take Anti-Slavery ground, and so assist in arresting 
the onward progress of slavery, and ultimately remove the curse 
from American soil. This volume shows some touches of cer- 
tain lines of his activity; although little remains in print, from 
liis pen, on the subject. The letters here published show the con- 
tinuation of this contest, set on foot by Dr. Bishop; modified 

45 



later on by Dr. MacMaster, and so foufjht out by him, and by 
Dr. Thomas, as this record discloses. In this contest, Dr. Rob- 
ert H. Bishop was the first to fall ; and his removal from the 
presidency of Miami University was the first and costliest sacri- 
fice demanded and obtained by the pro-slavery element in the 
Presbyterian Church in the Northwest.* This occurred in 1840 ; 
Dr. Bishop was deposed into a professorship, where he remained 
until 1845, when, for the sole reasons above stated, he and Prof, 
t^cott, — the most accomplished professor Miami ever had, and an 
early and efficient abolitionist, — were both removed under the 
avowed pretext of "harmonizinji the views of all parties."" 

The successor of Dr. Bishop was chosen and named by that 
same Princeton influence which dominated the Presbyterian 
Church in the interest of slavery, for a generation, and until 
the beginning of the war of 1801. He appeared in Dr. Junkin, a 
robust champion of the biblical sanction of human slavery, and 
who had been of all men in the East, most prominent in bring- 
ing about the Presbyterian disruption into its Old and New 
School divisions. 

In their action of 1840, the Trustees of Miami University 
were sore pressed for avowable reason for their action ; and they 
found it in the formal charge that the president had been derelict 
in duty in not rigidly collecting tuition fees from indigent students. 
Recollection of the day had never been absent from the mind of 
Dr. Bishop, when, a penniless and awkward country boy, he 
had hung around the ]»rofessor's room in Edinburgh IJniversity 
to ascertain ''the lowest terms"' on which he might taste the 
sweets of learning; nor of the immeasurable blessings to himself 
and others which the grace then accorded him had brought. To 
the above charge he pleaded guilty, and filed a defense from 
the MS. of which I quote: 

"I freely admit that there were oases where a more rigid enforce- 
ment of the regulation would have secured some payments which have 
been lost. These cases were, however, few, when c-ompared with those 
of another nature. Had the regulation in every case beeil rigidly en- 
forced, a far larger number from whom there was ultimately no loss, 
would never have entered, or would not have been continued. One-half 
of the graduates of 1840, who have since liquidated all their debts, would 
have been forced to go home ; some of them in their Junior year, and 
others at the commencement of their Senior year ; had advance-payments 
been essentially necessary to their continuance as students. Besides, no 
public, literary institution can ever ultimately suffer from being indulgent 

* On the question of the removal of Dr. Rishop, among those voting 
aye, was P. P. Lowe, of Dayton ; but twenty years later he gave housing 
and hospitality to Dr. MacMaster when he was outcast and had the Phil- 
istines upon him in this same cause; for this Sit tihi terra Icvis. — A. A. T. 

46 



in this respect, to otherwise promising young men. I add to all, that my 
personal responsibilities, and the personal responsibilities of one or two 
tvho acted with me, in behalf of those who would otherwise have left the 
institution during 1S39-1S4Q, were upwards of $2000. The details in con- 
nection with this class of facts can be given at any time, to any of the 
genuine friends of Miami University."' 

The removal of Drs. Bishop and Scott did an injury to 
Miami University greater than could be at the time realized, and 
which has never been overcome. Dissensions and dissatisfaction 
that ensued withdrew interest in its welfare and a support on 
which that welfare depended. The old reputation of the institu- 
tion long- survived its character and its deserts. But lately a 
new president and new faculty took possession, deserving in 
all respects of students who did not come. 

Of all Dr. Bishop's children, perhaps the most able and 
scholarly was George, his companion and eldest son. In him, 
his father saw with unconcealed delight a promise of all he 
thought a young man ought to be, when this son became profes- 
sor of Biblical Literature in the Seminary then attached to 
Hanover College. His sudden death there, in 1837, broke the 
old man's heart. No cry, no complaint escaped his lips when 
this loss was mentioned, only loud and redundant praises of the 
mercy and goodness of God. But from this time on, his pupils 
and acquaintances noticed that a certain rough jocundity which 
had been his habit, was gone; and into his public addresses 
there came more and more those quaint and exquisite descrip- 
tions of a life in the world to come. Indeed, Dr. Bishop always 
taught his pupils to live as if on a campaign and away from 
home, whence a recall and tidings might be looked for at any 
hour. 

Through the agency chiefly of General Samuel F. Gary and 
of his brother, the late Freman G. Gary, Esq., Dr. Bishop became 
president of Farmer's College at College Hill, near Cincinnati, 
Ohio. The number of students here in attendance was large but 
of miscellaneous preparation and grade, yet upon many of them 
the President made an impress never forgotten. Here the 
alumni of Miami built him a home that sheltered his old age. 
He died in 1855. "I give,'' he said in a characteristic will, "I 
give my soul to the Redeemer, as I have often endeavored to do, 
to be received on the same condition that the thief on the cross 
was received. I give my body to the Directors of Farmer's 
College to be enclosed in a metallic-lined box, and to be placed 
in a mound to be formed of successive layers of sand and earth, 
which shall have no artificial monument, but only an evergreen 
tree thereon." The other day, the Presbytery in session at 
College Hill, went out and held services around the grave of 
Dr. Bishop. His pupils are widely scattered and his memory 

47 



must remain "onlv a tradition in many families." But there are 
many living, and long will be, who remember with reverence 
that little mound at College Hill ; and the sons of Dr. Thomas 
want to place a wreath upon it. — A. A. T. 

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTE. 

Dr. Bishop: his faults; graces; singular power in public ad- 
dresses at times. J. Cabell Breck en ridge's funeral. Worm 
Kentucky friendship for Bishop. 

Note. Like Lincoln, Dr. Bishop suffered for his unconven- 
tionality: he was homespun, and was born, and died a Scotch 
peasant. Over some faults, old age throws her mantle of charity 
and grace. 

Yet he was habitually courtly. He could go up to a lady in 
a large company of cultiv^ated people, and speak to her in a way 
that would make her feel distinguished the rest of the day, and 
yet she could not remember that he had said anything, and in 
fact he had not. 

You rightly say he had a hot temper and was capable of a 
mighty wrath. Thoughtless persons at times suddenly found this 
out. My mother who died last year, aged eighty-seven, was 
brought to Hamilton as a bride, in 1840. She was full of stories 
about Dr. Bishop which she would tell when the spirit moved 
her. She told me this. 

Once, in chapel service, a boy was playing comic pranks. 
The students said President Bishop "prayed with one eye open" 
and caught him flagrante delictu. Without stopping in his pray- 
er, he leaped upon the culprit's shoulders and bore him to the 
floor. 

No printed report gave adequate expression of the singular 
effect of the Doctor's addresses upon these Western audiences. 
Men and women w^ould go away from his meetings roused and 
excited, unable to tell why they felt so. Of course, one secret of 
this power was moral earnestness; Carlisle sometimes had this. 
Froude who reported his "Inaugural as 'Rector of the University 
of Edinburg" wrote, "At times the assemblage seemed moved 
as by subterranean fires." 

Once in trying to exj[)ress the regret that T had not helped 
my father, I quoted Carlisle's words in like case: 

"Through life I had "given my father very little, having little 
to give ; he needed little, and from me expected nothing. Thou 
who wouldst give, give quickly ; in the grave thy loved one can re- 
ceive no kindness." 

A friend said, on reading these lines, he seized his check 
book; w^ent straight to a country home; took his parents to Cin- 
cinnati, and sent them back with comfortable, costly furniture, 
they protesting. 

48 



Dr. Bishop was never disappointing on important occasions; 
and perhaps he influenced educated people most of all. 

John Cabell Breckenridge, in 1823, was the most promising 
of his father's sons, and a founder and an elder of the Presbyter- 
ian church in Lexington, where Prof. Bishop ministered. Grad- 
uated at Princeton in 1810, he had married the daughter of Pres- 
ident Sam'l Stanhope Smith of that college ; and Rev. Dr. Jno. C. 
Young, later of Center College and of the Seminary at Danville, 
was to marry his daughter. When quite young, and Secretary 
of State at Frankfort, Cabell Breckenridge died, and his body was 
brought to Lexington for burial. Into this crowded church at his 
funeral was gathered the elite of Kentucky; and through them 
slowly moved to the pulpit front, all the Breckenridge connection, 
preceded by the coffin and the widow. She led by the hand her 
boy, John C, afterwards to become candidate against Douglas 
and against Lincoln and General in the Confederate Army. 

Prof. Bishop preached the funeral sermon. What he said, 
some one of the family tried to preserve by this blurred pamphlet 
of three pages. These are the opening paragraphs : 

"As for man. bis days are as grass, as the flower of the field so be 
flourisbetb; for the wind passetb over it. and it is gone, and the place 
thereof shall know it no more. But the mercy of the Lord is from ever- 
lasting to everlasting upon them that fear him, and his righteousness 
unto children's children." 

"The grave and eternity are not gloomy things ; nor shall we 
either be forgotten or cease from enjoyment, when our place 
shall not be known on earth. We are immortal as well as mortal 
beings, and the very principles in our nature by which we are 
connected with one another and endeared to one another here, 
are used to connect us with Eternity, and with the Father of 
Eternity, and with one another as His children. 

Our departed friend was everything which a friend, and a 
husband, and a father, and a son could be. That such a man was 
bestowed upon us and continued with us while he was, — this was 
no common mercy. He was taken from us suddenly, in the prime 
and vigor of life. Let our loins be girded and our lamps be burn- 
ing, for at such an hour as we think not our hour may come." 

Jefferson Dams two years in Dr. Bishop's class at Transylvania. 
His trihute to Bishop as an instructor. Did he lack disci- 
pline? iStory about Dr. Tlvonias' difficulties in "discipline" 
at Hanover College. 

At Transylvania in Prof. Bishop's class for two years, 1821-3, 
was a handsome, aristocratic boy, Jefferson Davis, of Mississippi, 
who in time became "President of the (Confederate States." In 
his last year, he began to dictate his autobiography published 

49 



with pride by his wife — "Memoir" Vol. 1, pag:e 23. His age and 
wonderful experience give weight to this testiraonv as to the qual- 
ity of his college professor. No man in America valued ^'disci- 
pline'' more than he, or could quicker recognize its efficiency or 
abuse. By such a man as Jefferson Davis, the faults of Bishop 
and not his merits, might have been remembered. This v/as not 
the case. I quote his words. 

The professoi- of Latin aiid Greek, and vice-president of the Univer- 
sity, was a Scotchman. Rev. Mr. Bishop, afterward president of a college 
in Ohio. (Kenyon, I believe it was.) a man of larsre attainments and very 
varied knowledge. His lectures in history are remembered as well for 
wide information as for their keen appreciation of the characteristics of 
mankind. His hero of all the world was William Wallace. In his lec- 
tures on the history of the Bible his faith was that of a child, not doubting 
nor questioning, and believing literally as it was written. 

"A vulgar boy. in the junior class, committed some outrage during the 
recitation, which Dr. Bishop chose to punish as became the character of 
the offender. His inability to draw a straight line on the blackboard 
caused him to keep a very large ruler, broad and flat, with which he used 
to guide the chalk. Calling the boy to him. he laid him across his knee 
and commenced paddling him with the big ruler. The culprit mumbled 
that it was against the law to whip a collegiate, 'Yes,' said the old gen- 
tleman, momentarily stopping his exercise, 'but every rule has its excep- 
tions, Toney.' Then he whacked him again, and there would not have been 
a dissenting voice if the question had been put as to the justice of the 
chastisement." 

Bishop's lack of discipline is a fiction, disseminated in the 
biography of Junkin, with whom it was a frequent text in his 
first year. It was better than Dr. Junkin's or Dr. McMaster's, 
without fault of either. College discipline requires respect, and 
good will, with a firm hand in extreme cases. In short, Dr. 
Bishop had better discipline than any President of Miami, of his 
generation. 

When Thos. E. Thomas was President of Hanover College, at 
a night wedding, unendurable disorder of students took place 
outside, and my father pursuing in the dark, felled one with his 
cane and took him prisoner. This brought about incipient rebel- 
lion, as they claimed it was not ''fair." 

In the half-hour before supper time, the students as a body 
would wait at the postoffice, for the Madison stage which brought 
the daily mail. Here, they were always hilarious and often dis- 
orderly. Going through them to his mail-box, then my father 
was insulted by a stalwart student. Whipping off his coat, he 
laid it on the ground, saying loudly, "Dr. Thomas, you lie there.'' 
Then raising his fists, boxer-like, he backed the offender through 
the crowd and beyond, amid the plaudits of the student body. 
It was a fair call on equal terms. That was all. There was a 
permanent change of sentiment : discipline was restored, with 
good humor. 

50 



My father was forty-one, quick, short or "stocky," and 
stronger than any man 1 ever knew of his profession who had 
done no physical labor. A. A. T., May, 1909. 

TO REV. E. D. MACMASTER, D. D, 

About the removal of Dr. Bishop and Prof. Scott. T. E. Thomas 
appeals to Dr. MacMaster to help re-instate them. Thinks 
prosperity of the college at staJce. 

Hamilton, O., 14 January, 1845. 

Sir: — I am personally unacquainted with you, and perhaps 
you have never heard of me; but the deep interest I feel in the 
prosperity of that institution whose Presidency you have recent- 
ly accepted, induces me to address you. 

Sixteen years have elapsed since I entered Miami University 
as a student; and more than ten since I graduated. For the 
last ten years, during part of which I have resided at Hamilton, 
(about twelve miles from Oxford), I have been well acquainted 
with all the Professors, and have had the pleasure of a particu 
lar intimacy with Drs. Bishop and Scott. Belonging to the 
same Synod and Presbytery, I have frequently at Oxford, had 
familiar intercourse with them in public, in the pulpit and 
lecture-room, and at the fireside. I have occasionally attended 
at the request of the Faculty and Trustees, the annual college 
examinations. I am personally acquainted with nearly all the 
members of the Board of Trustees, and have for years been an 
attentive observer of their proceedings. I am also acquainted 
with a large majority of the three hundred alumni of the Univer- 
sity; and am in constant correspondence with many of them 
residing in different parts of the country. I make these 
statements for no other reason than to assure you that in w^hat 
I am about to say, I do not speak without opportunities of 
knowing that whereof I affirm. 

You are aware that the Trustees of Miami University, at 
the last meeting, vacated the chairs of Dr. Scott and Prof. 
Waterman, and abolished the Professorship of Dr. Bishop. Prof. 
Waterman is a young man, whose connection with the institution 
is recent and transcient, and he has therefore no such claim on 
the sympathies of the public. With the venerable Dr. Bishop 
and with Dr. Scott, it is quite otherwise. Of Dr. Bishop's 
character as a man, a scholar, a Christian, a teacher of youth, 
I need say nothing. You are well acquainted with it. I shall 
only say that the charge so industriously circulated to his 
prejudice that age has incapacitated him from rendering further 
service to that institution, is a fiction invented to conceal motives 
which they are too dishonorable to avow. Dr. Bishop came to 
Ohio when it was comparatively a wilderness. He labored with 

51 



a few students to build up a University, and for twenty years 
has labored faithfully and efficiently. He gathered around him 
competent assistants; and he had won for Miami University the 
enviable title of the Yale of the West. But he was virtually 
cast out of the Presidency; and now, in a venerable old age, 
at the close of a life spent in diligent and disinterested public 
service, he is turned out of the Institution penniless and all but 
homeless. This community, Sir, and especially the alumni, can- 
not but feel that the treatment which Ur. Bishop has experienced 
is dishonorable, mean and injurious to the Institution. 

In regard to Dr. Scott, the recent action was scarcely less 
offensive. He has been a Professor in Miami University some 
sixteen or seventeen years. He performed the duties of his 
office unexceptioually in the days of her glory. His pupils fill 
with acceptance, similar stations in other colleges. He is known 
in the community as an exemplary Christian, an accomplished 
scholar, a kind, patient, efficient instructor; and in private, as 
an amiable, polished gentleman. Some paltry reasons are indeed 
assigned for his removal; but the reasons are only such as to 
excite contempt and indignation. Drs. Bishop and Scott, two] 
old and faithful Professors, are thus dismissed. Do you ~ask j 
why? T can tell you, Sir, in a few words. Their deficiency in j 
thorough-going Old School partizanship and their anti-slavery j 
•principles are the real grounds for their romoval. * * * * -^i 

My principal reason for laying these facts before you is 
to say that, in the judgment of all with whom I have communi- 
cated, in what I have no doubt is the judgment of a majority of 
the community, the prosperity of Miami requires that both these 
gentlemen be re-instated in their Professorships. And as I 
sincerely desire its prosperity as much as success to yourself in 
presiding over the institution; as I hope that great good will 
result therefrom to this valley, and to the whole West; I most 
respectfully suggest to your consideration, that there are no 
means by which these objects can be so successfully promoted; 
nor any way by which you can so certainly secure the respect 
and regard of the alumni, and the good will of the whole com- 
munity, as by employing your influence at the approaching 
meeting of the Board of Trustees for their re-establishment in 
the University. 

Should justice be refused to these gentlemen, the Board may 
rest assured that their friends will not suffer the aft'ront to pass 
in silence. The public must know the secret history of the whole 
affair; and the kind of policy exercised by a particular party 
in attempting to control a state institution. And those who 
know the state of public sentiment in this region have little 
reason to doubt that if Presbyterians engage again in contro- 

52 



versies between themselves respecting that institution, their 
dynast}^ over it is done for, and the scepter will pass to some 
other denomination. 

I hope the importance of the matter under consideration 
will constitute a sufficient apology for my communication. T 
have no personal interests whatever involved. I have written 
freely and honestly and confidentially. 

Hoping to see you hereafter at Oxford, cordially and happily 
co-operating with 'l)rs. Bishop and Scott, and with the other 
able members of the faculty at Oxford, I remain, 

Most respectfully yours, etc. 

Thomas E. Thomas. 

From Rev. Dr. E. D. MacMaster 

Rehukes T. E. Thonws. Tells him he eannot he moved l)y threats. 
Tries to teach him to use conciliatorij language. 

Madison, Ind., Jany 18, 1845. 
Rev. and dear Sir: 

Yours of the 14th inst. at hand. 

From the time the information came to me of the appoint- 
ment , unsought by myself, which the Trustees of Miami ITniver 
sity have done me the honor to make, the relations of Urs. Bishop 
and Scott to the University became a subject of deep interest to 
me. The moment I decided that it was my duty to accept my 
own appointment, I took the liberty to communicate with Dr. 
Bishop, and with some of the Trustees, with a view to bring 
about, if possible, an arrangement by which he should continue 
to be connected with the institution. * * * * 

That I did not do the same thing in the case of Dr. Scott 
arose from no unfavorable feeling toward him. * * * * 

I take the liberty to say, that dispositions on all sides more 
conciliatory than the language and tone of some parts of your 
letter, are necessary to harmony among the various interests in- 
volved in the university. Considering my relations to the trus- 
tees, it would be better that such language concerning them 
should not be addressed to me. * * * * 

In what you say in part there is at least an api)earance of 
menace, of which I presume you are scarcely aware. For I take 
it, you yourself must regard as utterly unfit for any public trust 
any man capable of being awed by such means into any course 
which his own sense of duty would not prompt. 

Very respectfully yours, 

E. D. Mac^Master. 

53 



Dr. MacMaster; sketch of his life. President of Hanover Col 
lege. Fine advice to graduating class, comparing results of 
study with extempore work. Was a Democrat, not an aholi- 
tionist. His great address at Miami, on resigning the presi- 
dency in 1849. His valuable loork henceforth, in maintain- 
ing, reviving, moderating and directing the anti-slavery sen- 
timent in the church. Ablest answer to Dr. Hodge of 
Princeton on biblical sanction of slavery. What the future 
historian will not fail to note. Death scene of Dr. MacM. 
at Chicago. His last message. Dr. Thomas' great address 
at his funeral, to a "fete Presbyterian folk'\ 

m 

Note. Rev. Erasmus Darwin MacMaster, D. D., born at 
Mercer, Pa., in 1806, was one of the six children and the second 
son of Rev. Dr. Gilbert and Jane (Brown) MacMaster. His 
grandfather, harassed by the persecutions, left a resi^ectable 
position in Scotland and at g^eat sacrifice of property, settled 
in the County of Down, Province of Ulster, in Ireland, whence 
his son, Gilbert, emigrated to America in early boyhood. An 
old family record says his ancestors were men ''not depending 
for reputation on the little vanity of having sprung from persons 
distinguished in their day as butchers and plunderers of their 
fellows ; nor even as the retainers of such, upon whom the chief 
of the banditti may have bestowed the title of noble; nor did 
our forebears cherish pride of personal achievement because of 
rising from the dregs of poverty and meanness. Thus \vf cnn 
pride ourselves not upon connection with a doubtful feudal 
nobility, nor upon extreme poverty, but simply upon an ancient, 
respectable independence and trust in God for daily bread." 

Dr. Gilbert MacMaster was first a physician, but afterwards 
became a minister in the Reformed Presbyterian Church. His 
son, Erasmus D. was graduated at Union College in 1827; 
studied divinity under his father, and for the following seven 
years had his first and only pastoral charge at Ballston, N. Y. 
These early days seem to have been passed in studious retirement 
and a full measure of scholarly preparation; and it was one of 
the passions of his life to urge the same upon others; but from 
this leisure, he was aroused by the urgent educational needs of 
r- the church in the West. In 1838, he became President of 
Hanover College, in Indiana. This institution, in its founder 
and many of its early supporters, had known men of noble type ; 

V but the educational ideals of southern Indiana, in 1838, were not 
high; and there can be no doubt that the patrons of this college 
and the new President found much on first acquaintance which 
was a mutual surprise. Dr. MacMaster was a plain talker; both 

^parties were good fighters: and controversies ensued, in which, 
as Dr. Thomas said, "the wounds inflicted were mutual." Dr. 

54 



MacMaster, in mistaken zeal, attempted to remove the college 
to Madison, but failed. 

In an address to the graduating class, in 1839, President Mac 
Master said: 

"But gentlemen, study, — study, — study, thoroughly, deeply, intensely 
the departments of human learning that bear especially upon your own 
particular aims and pursuits. Avoid ignorance on these subjects. Avoid 
crudeness in your knowledge of that which it is your particular business 
to know well. Avoid crudeness in your performances. In order to do this, 
study. Its extempore character is not among the glories of the Nineteenth 
Century. Extempore speaking, and extempore writing, and extempore act- 
ing are enervating the strength of every profession, evaporating the mind 
of our country, cursing the land, and starving the church of God! Let 
your studies be well directed. Let them aim at practical results. But fear 
not, gentlemen, the taint of lamp-oil upon your work." 

In 1845, Dr. MacMaster was elected President of Miami 
University, to succeed Rev. Dr. Geo. Junkin, and removed to 
Oxford, Ohio. Rev. Dr. J. M. Stevenson, so long Secretary of 
the American Tract Society, has written, ''Dr. Thomas was 
almost the first, both in time and ability, in our church, in the 
West, who thoroughly studied and manfully defended the right 
of the slave to freedom." Who, of such, were first in time, the 
notes in this volume fully and more accurately disclose. Dr. E. 
I). MacMaster was the first in ability, and first in the ertort, and, 
finally, in the sacrifice he made, in the anti-slavery contest in 
the Presbyterian Church.* 

Beyond all others, his influence, efforts and ability were 
clear and commanding in maintaining a powerful anti-slavery 
movement, not of the church, but in the Presbyterian church ; 
and when that movement was, perhaps, most diflicult to main- 
tain, which was after the remarkable, late growth of the slave 
power, and just before the great uprising. But he never was, in 
any technical sense, an abolitionist : he had refused to join any 
abolition society ; nor would he have ever subscribed to the 
resolutions which Dr. Thomas so early and so often wrote to 
express the due and proper attitude of the church. If, as I 
think has been fairly said elsewhere, anti-slavery men are entitled 
to rank in honor according to their priorities of date, no high 
rank would be assigned to Dr. MacMaster; but when he came, 
he was a host. The pre-eminence claimed for him, however, must 
be confined to the years from 1855 to 1860 : yet this was a time 

* Except Rev. Dr. Robert J. Breekenridge? Dr. B. never did 
anything in the anti-slavery controversy which cost him much, barring po- 
litical preferment, and that he did not want. But it is hard to say that 
in whatever he was concerned with, anybody else stood first in influence or 
ability. "Why did Grant go ahead of the other Union Generals"? asked 
my son the other day. I replied. "Because of his ability". "What", was 
the next and unanswerable question of the little boy, "What do you mean 
by ability"? / 

55 



7 



when a "Kentucky mist" had settled down upon the Emancipa- 
tionists of that State, until no one across the river could tell 
the difference between Robert J. Breckinridge and Stuart 
Robison. 

There had been no change in the politics of a majority of 
the trustees of Miami University, who had deposed Dr. Bishop, 
and who chose Dr. MacMaster in part because of his moderation 
of views on the subject of slavery. In fact, Dr. MacMaster was 
a Democrat. "I am," he said, " a democrat as I understand 
democracy:" and he denounced "the evil of an excessively 
augmenting public revenue, collected, contrary to the principles 
and genius of a democratic government, by indirect taxation; 
and consequent corruption." Dr. MacMaster never married. His 
father, now aged and retired from active ministry, and also his 
sisters, constituted his family here, and while they survived, 
remained under his roof as long as he was able to maintain a 
household. Many able and prominent men,— among others, 
Grimke of South Carolina. Wm. M. i'ovy, Samuel (ialloway. Dr. 
John r. Young, Dr. John W. Scott, Chauncey N. Olds, Rt. Rev. 
J. B. Purcell and Gov. Chas. Anderson, — have delivered addresses 
at Oxford ; but reading them now, it is plain that none of them 
have ever equalled in merit Dr. MacMaster's public addresses 
there. Most notable of tljese was that on the occasion of his 
resigning the Presidency, delivered Commencement Day, 1849. 
In no page of our literature can words be found to equal these 
on the subject of the necessity and value of a proper training 
for professional men. 

"The true object of college studies is to give to younj: meu. beside the 
formatiou of high and noble aud gentlemanly character, the intellectual 
development, training, and discipline qualifying them for the studies and 
the subsequent exercise of the liberal professions and for the conduct 
of public affairs In the different departments of life. To qualify men for 
this all their intellectual faculties must be <iuickened. sharpened, invigor- 
ated. They must acquire the i)o\ver and the habit of searching and thor- 
ough investigation ; of accurate observation ; of keen-sighted discrimina- 
tion ; of prec-ise, exact and truthful conception aud detinition : of high, 
sound and just generalization; and of close and rigorous ratiocination on 
everv subject of their inquiry; and of a sober, chastened, and well-bal- 
anced judgment, and broad, large, and comprehensive views upon all the 
great interests of man that come before them and on which they are 
called to act. To accomplish this object approin-iate means must be used ; 
the exercise of these intellectual faculties in a course of long and severe 
studies and upon commanding objects of intellectual interest: aud this 
must be carried on without the continual obtrusion upon us at every step 
of that miserable, mean-spirited, inquiry, what's its use? — its use in refer- 
ence to a utilitarianism of the narrowest views and the most contracted 
spirit. 

Well then. — if you wish that the young men who are to be your 
physicians, crude, and coarse, and low-minded, shall compound pills with- 
out knowledge and hawk them out without judgment and without con- 
science, to cure or to kill as chance may determine; college studies are of 
no vise to them. But if you desire that the men whom you admit to the 

56 



most confidential intimacies of your liouseholdP. and into whose hands 
you put the life of yourselves and your families in the day of sickness 
and danger, shall be gentlemen of refinement, of delicacy, of honour; and. 
bringing to the investigation of medical science and its application with 
discernment and judgment to the healing art. a well-disciplined mind 
trained to habits of observation, of reflection, or discrimination, of scien- 
tific inferring, shall become what so many of that enlightened and humane 
profession have ahvavs been, the alleviators of human suffering, the re- 
storers of health, the conservators of life, the ministering angels of your 
households, so often driving the destroyer Death from your doors ;— if this 
be what you desire them to be, I need not tell you of what use to them is 
all liberal learning and the highest intellectual as well as moral culture. 
If you mean that vour son shall be only a little scribbling attorney and 
quibbling, shirking 'pettifogger, the liberal studies of the college are of no 
use to hit)!. 

But if you mean that he shall be a laui/cr, with an eye to 
discern amid statutes and cases a principle, with the head to compreheud 
the relation between principle and principle, and with the soul to feel the 
moral dignity and grandeur of that great body of civil and criminal juris- 
prudence which the wisdom of ages has reared up as a bulwark for the 
protection of the right and the punishment of the wrong: the defender 
of the innocent: the worthy and able expositor and pleader of what is one 
noble department of that more general Lav, "whose seat is the bosom of 
God; its voice the harmony of the universe; to which all things in heaven 
and earth do homage ; the least as feeling its care, the greatest as not 
exempt from its power",— if this be what you mean your son shall be, I 
need not tell you of what use to him is all good learning, and the severest 
discipline, sharpening his wits, and giving clearness, and grasp, and power 
to his intellect. 

If you intend your son shall be the hanger-on and hack of 
this or that unscrupulous and i)rofligate political party, to take his cue 
from his file leader, to advance when the party advances, to recede when 
it recedes; to face about when it faces about ;— all freedom of thought 
prohibited, all fearless and honest inquiry after and advocacy of the truth 
suppressed, all manly spirit of independence in his bosom crushed, all 
generous sentiments of justice and magnanimity in his heart extinguished, 
all sense of personal responsibility lost : to shout when he is directed to 
shout and hiss when he is directed to hiss, to applaud and to calumniate 
whom and what and when he is bidden; and to take his pay in the share 
of "the spoils" he may be able to grab in the scramble of the division ; — 
the veriest slave of unprincipled and heartless faction : — if this be what 
you intend your son shall be, why certainly a college is not the school to 
Which you should send him. But if you desire that your son should aspire 
to be what is still higher than the lawyer; — "for the wisdom of the lawyer 
is one thing, and that of the law-maker another ;"— if you should have 
him aspire to be, and God have given him, what he gives to few, the head 
and the heart to be what is higher than the lawyer— to be a Stateftman.— 
from a deep and thorough insight into the whole physical, intellectual, 
moral, and social constitution of man and of all the circumstances that 
go to modify the condition of man among different peoiiles and in different 
times, to evolve the great principles of legislation and government, and 
verifying these by lessons of wisdom drawn from the dejiths of a profound 
philosophy, and illustrating and confirming them by the light collected from 
the history of all nations and ages, with the penetrating sight, the far- 
reaching grasp of thought, the comprehending views, the generalizing and 
combining power, and the fertile invention of the ApxtTcxomxy <f>p6vy(TL<i, 
the master-mind — to seize great political and economical truths which lie 
unobserved by other men, and to strike out new lines of policy by which 
the people are made prosperous and states are made great :— if this be 

57 



what you would have your son aspire to be, then I suppose it is obvious 
enough of what use to him are the highest culture of intellect and the 
most earnest pursuit of all liberal knowledge and learning. 

If you expect those who are to be your future ministers of religion to dole 
out for the thousandth time in the stereotype phrases of dull insipidity, the 
common-place talk which they have absorbed from those around them, inmixe i 
and diversified ever and anon with their own erroneous crudities; or to 
supply with noisy vociferation and wordy volubility, or with lov," and i)ro- 
fane antics and clap-trap devices, the want of thought, and sense, and 
piety;— why then indeed I do not myself see that they have any need nt 
all of Greek, or Logic, or Metaphysics; or learning of any kind. But if 
you would have the men who are to be for you and for the world "stew- 
ards of the mysteries of God", and the preachers of that gospel which is 
to them who hear, in some the savour of death unto death, and in some 
of life unto life ;— if you would have them, feeling the dignity of Heaven'.^ 
high commission, God's embassy of reconciliation to rebellious men. and 
how dread a thing it is to stand between the Majesty in the he.'ivens and 
perishing sinners, and treat with them of things involving such issues as 
those of the great salvation ;— if you would have them, feeling this, to 
bring to the interpretation of the Sacred Oracles, beside the requisite spir- 
itual qualification, the mental cajtacity and the intellectual furniture of 
independent interpreters, that having the mind of the Spirit therein, ns 
Scribes thoroughly instructed unto the kingdom of heaven, they may ex- 
pound and apply "the Scriptures, that by the faith of these men may havp 
God's gift of eternal life in His Son;— Oh! friends, if this: is what you 
would have your future ministers of religion to be. then you will never 
again think of asking of what use to them is the disciplinary training that 
can by any and all means enlarge the capacity and increase the power of 
their intellect, or of the widest range of knowledge and learning that can 
be brought to bear upon this 'relief of man's estate'." 

Dr. Mac-Master left tlie presidency of Miami University hop- 
ing that he might Iceep alive the New Albany Theological 
Seminary. His advent there was the signal for an assualt upon 
him and that institution from almost all the pro-slavery organs 
and ministers of the church.* Dr. Thomas soon went to his 
friend's assistance,— but it is needless to comment on or tell the 
story now, which these letters have narrated. 

From this time forth, and without any wish or intent on 
his part that it should be so, the main work of Dr. MacMaster's 

* The Southern Presbyterian, published at Columbia, South 
Carolina, by the professors of the Presbyterian Theological 
Seminary located there, said editorially, on the appointment 
of Dr. Thomas to the chair in the New Albany Seminary : 

"Dr. Thomas, of whom we know little except that he is held iu much 
esteem for his abilities in his own part of the country, has accepted a 
chair in the seminary at New Albany, and by so doing will, no doubt, 
give a new impetus to this institution, whose existence has Iveen seriously 
threatened by the establishment of the Danville Seminary. Dr. Thomas 
some years since was a conspicuous leader of the abolition party in Ohio. 
Whether he has changed his views on that subject or not, we are not 
Informed ; but if he has not. the fears which have been entertained, may 
prove not altogether groundless, namely, that the New Albany Seminary 
may become an engine for the propagation of abolitionism in the North 
West. Dr. MacMaster, another professor, is not free from the suspicion 
of a similar taint." 

58 



life was in maintaining, reviving, moderating, and directing the , 
anti-slavery sentiment of the church. With what wisdom, 
eloquence, and resolution he did this, can in part be shown by 
quotation from his published speeches and letters. In an address 
on *'The True Life of A Nation," delivered at Miami University, 
in 1856, he said : 

"On slavery where it already exists, I have selduin publicly spoken or 
written, because not living among a slaveholding people, I have thought it 
less my vocation to discuss this subject than evils existing among our- 
selves ; and because I have been convinced that, if the question of slavery 
is to have an issue, peaceful and beneficial to all the parties concerned, 
men living in the midst of it alone are competent to deal effectually with 
it; and I have always cherished, and am still disposed to cherish, the 
hope, that there will be found in the States where slavery exists true- 
hearted ministers of the Divine Word, and true statesmen, who, in their 
respective spheres, would be faithful in the great work which God has 
laid upon them ; in preparing the way and guiding the people in measures 
for the abolition of the whole system. Whenever I have spoken upon this 
subject, it has been with a clear and full recognition of the manifold 
and great difficulties which embarass the question of slavery and the slave 
population, as one to be practically dealt with; with disapproval of the 
injustice of indiscriminate denunciation of all the guilty and the innocent 
alike, who are in any way connected with the system ; and with an ac- 
knowledgement of the great consideration which I think is justly due to 
honest-hearted men, implicated unwillingly in the evils of the system, who 
are doing the best they can under their circumstances, and are seeking, 
in patience and prudence, by means wise, safe, and feasible, to bring it as 
soon as possible to an end." 

"All this I have always said: all this I now repeat. But having said 
these things, I say further, that when the question is about a demand on 
the ichole nation, the Free States as well as the slaveholding. through the 
national government, to nationalize a system which exists only by local law, 
or custom having the force of law, and to perpetuate it. and extend it into 
new territories, then, fellow-citizens, the question belongs to you, to me, 
and to us all, and to each of us; the merits of the system are open to 
discussion; and upon it. as upon all other great political and moral evils 
which afflict our country, and its remedy, I must speak as I have always 
done, plain and fearless words, according to the truth of the case as I 
apprehend it. Christianity I believe to be the true remedy for all moral 
evils, and for all political evils which arise from moral causes. I believe 
that it is the only effectual remedy for this evil of slavery. Let us enquire 
how Christianity deals with slavery." 

"The Epistle of Philemon is, I believe, with the "Christian" defenders 
of slavery, the classical epistle; though, for the life of me, I never could 
see why. W^ell, what does the Epistle to Philemon say? Onesimus, a fugi- 
tive slave, came to Rome, where he met Paul, and was by his ministry 
converted to Christianity. Paul sent him back to his master Philemon, 
also a Christian, with a letter. And what does the letter say? 'To the 
Honorable Mr. Philemon, greeting; Sir: I, Paul, the Apostle of Jesus 
Christ, being here at Rome, on the business of my apostleship. have caught 
Onesimus, your tool with a soul in it running away ; and having captured 
it, and handcuffed it. I had it up before the Pr;pfect, and have got out a 
warrant ; and now I send back to you .vour tool with a soul in it, in chains, 
that you may recover your property : for we have a law, and by our law 
you have an 'undoubted right to your tool with a soul in it. And the grace 
of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brother Philemon; Amen!" 
Was this the Epistle? No; not exactly. Happily the document is extant. 

59 



and in your own hands, and in your own tongue wlierein you were born, 
that you may read and understand. How read you?— Taul. a prisoner of 
Jesus Christ* to Philemon: — / 7)iight he much liold in Jesus Chriftt to enjoin 
thee that which is concenieut ; yet for love's sake I rather beseech thee for 
my son Onesimus; whom I have sent again. Thou, therefore receive him, 
that is mine oini hoirels. Receive him not now as a servant (a doulos. a 
tool, or a servant even) ; but above a servant, a brother.-— /?pcc(?y' him as 
MYSELF.' That is the letter. I think that if the Commissioners' papers 
under our fugitive slave law were made out in the terms of this mittimus 
of Paul, there would be no mobs about the matter, around Faneuil Hall, 
the old cradle of liberty." 

In a sermon published at New Albany in 1856. Dr. MacMaster said: 
"On this tojiic of sl.avery. the subject of a controversy often so wretch- 
edly managed on both sides. I feel it my duty to speak with jirecision. and 
even with circumspection. The slavery spoken of in this sermon is not any 
system of mere servitude, which recognizes the servant as a moral person, 
though in an inferior relation, and protects his riphts as snch : which servi- 
tude may be right or wrong, according to the circumstances of the case. 
But the slavery spoken of is that system which declares human beings to 
be, not moral persons, but 'goods and chattels', incapable of sustaining 
personal relations or possessing personal rights, with all that legitimately 
flows from this fundamental principle of the slavery with which we have 
to do. The distinction is vital to the whole question of the moral character 
of slavery. It is a distinction which a child, who chooses, can i>erceive. 
Slavery as the term is here used, and as it is defined by the laws creating 
the institution, no honest man will defend or say to be right. Why then 
should there be any controversy about it? As to the means of removal, 
among reflecting men there is a like agreement. All believe that this is 
mainly the moral power of the gospel, aided by political and economical 
considerations. But. trusting in the spirit of Christianity in the heart of 
the master as the only power that can be relied on to induce him to give 
to his bondman that which is just and equal, and to the same spirit to 
influence the servant to fulfill his duties, whether ns bond or free, it is 
the business of the church, and especially it is the business of the minis- 
ters of God's word, in fit time and place, with discriminate and right tem- 
per, to expound the Divine law in its application to the whole subject, and 
to point out the moral character of the existing institution of slavery as 
judged by that law." * 

Tn another note on the General Assembly at Indianapolis, in 
1859, something further has been stated and all that space allows 

* students of the anti-slavery controversy in the Presbyterian 
Church will note that Dr. MacMaster is here at work on the marrow of 
Prof. Chas. Hodge's adroit defense of slavery, which rougher and smaller 
ministers of the church in the West only reiterated and worked out in its 
further and legitimate conclusions. And the historian of this great Contro- 
versy, who will yet c-ome. will, when he comes, not fail to note that those 
in the church, at least in the North, who were friends and defenders of 
human slavery, did not claim that it w\as right, but denounced any asser- 
tion that it was wrong: whether the system was right or wrong, they 
claimed was no business of the church. When, later on. "The General As- 
sembly of the Confederate States" got off by themselves in an unay)proach- 
able independence, they "testified" on this old issue, in teni^s that would 
have satisfied Drs. Wilson. .Tunkin and Rice. They said : "We would have 
it distinctly understood that in our ecclesiastical capacity, we are neither 
the friends nor the foes of slavery. We have no right, as a church, to 
enjoin it as a duty, or to condemn it as a sin'".) 

60 



about the personnel of Dr. MacMaster, and his speech at Indian- 
apolis, the onlv time he ever appeared in any General Assembly 
of the church/ By probably all not in privity or sympathy with 
the causes or persons who brought it about, his practical banish- 
ment for nearly ten years was regarded as great waste of high 
faculties always needed and rarely found. There is something 
pitiable in the sight of such a man as he "raising corn upon a 
farm, in order that he might have bread to eat." Perhaps there 
is comfort in the thought that in that day, many things radically 
wrong in this country, were rapidly and radically righting 
themselves. At any rate, all his friends rejoiced when the 
General Assembly of the Church restored him to his professor- 
ship in the Seminary at Chicago, in 186G; and nothing in my 
father's life gave him a higher pleasure than to be officially 
appointed to communicate to him this intelligence. 

At the Seminary at Chicago, Dr. MacMaster's service was 
to last but a few months. All his colleagues and the students 
there bore witness to the gentleness and winning loveliness of 
his manner and intercourse with all about him, and to the skill, 
the fullness and ripened scholarship which he brought into his 
classroom instruction. The unaccustomed severity of this winter 
climate brought on a severe pneumonia, which ended his days 
on December 10, 1866. About his death bed, professors and 
students gathered in sympathy and awe. To their questions, he 
replied: "I have never expected to die in ecstacies, or to 
experience such transports as some Christians have done. It 
would not accord with the character of my mind or the nature of 
my religion." But life ebbed slowly away: here was a Puritan 
at his fife's end, who was closing a record of almost Apostolic 
devotion; and amid the wanderings of his mind, and the dribble 
of the report of what others said to him and he said to them, we 
get glimpses of the soul of old Dr. MacMaster: "The interests 
of this Seminary, and the inter-ests of truth and righteousness 
in connection with it, require that it shall be in the hands of 
those wl!0 would not oppress and destroy the image of God in 
man." *♦**♦* "n \^ a pleasant thought that T am 
going to be with that blessed mother and my beloved father and 

mv dear sisters, and where, besides these, will be all the Saints." 
***** 

"Satan comes to me and tempts me. He says I have not loved 

the Lord Jesus Christ, nor served him with all my heart. I have 

told my Savior that a thousand times. Get thee behind me, 

Satan ! Thou canst not take my Crown from me." 
♦ * ' * * * 

In response to prompt and due invitation. Dr. Thomas 
preached no sermon at the funeral in McCormick Theological 
Seminary; nor, later on, delivered any eulogy or address before 
the Presbyterian Historical Society of Philadelphia; but he met 

61 



the body en route from Chicago to Xenia, in charge of Dr. 
MacMaster's brother, expecting, with him, to go alone to see to 
its burial. But following the remains, or gathered there, with 
like intent, was a goodly number of staunch Presbyterian folk ; 
and, on their insistence, an extemporary funeral was held where 
Dr. Thomas delivered what I have always thought was the 
greatest of all his sermons.* 

Fine as were his scholarship, and faculty for instruction, 
and, at times, his epistolary or other writing, his most notable 
gift was not these, but chaste, fervid, effective oratorical speech. 
iSurelj', never was so great a funeral oration delivered to so 
small an audience, as was heard that day, which was wholly un- 
exjjected, and wholly unreported. 

Dr. MacMaster's bones are laid beside those of his family 
and kindred in the cemetery at Xenia, Ohio. — A. A. T. 



FROM PROFESSOR J. W. SCOTT. 
Dr. Junkin and ahoUtionisni in Miami University. 

Oxford. Feb. 19th, 1844. 

The bearer Avill inform you more particularly of the im- 
mediate object of this letter. I can but merely drop a line to 
add my confirmation to his report, and my request to that of 
a numlaer of the good friends here of which he is the bearer. 

We have recently had the old veteran in the abolition cause, 
Arnold Buffum, here delivering us three lectures bearing on the 
subject, which have brought out that champion, "the President 
of Mi-ami University, George Junkin, D. D."!I to deliver us a 
tirade on the subject of "rampant, fanatical, modern abolition- 
ism", to set our community right on the question. This evening 
we had the introductory, announced to be on the African Slave- 
trade, but which was headed with quite a fiery exordium, to 
give us a taste, I suppose, of what the conclusion is to be, 
against all abolitionism and abolitionists, and especially against 
that unprincipled old agitator and "prevaricator'', bought up 
and hired for the purpose, as the Dr. is to show before he is 
done, by "British Gold", whose name is at the head of this para- 
graph. Tomorrow evening he is to get into the marrow of the 
matter, by showing "the absurdity, the futility, the utter folly 

* Except one; delivered also unexpectedly, when, returninir from 
Oxford with me, he was stopped and pressed by his old parishioners into 
a called evening meeting, in the basement of the Hamilton Church. The 
associations of his Oxford visit, and of this place, seemed to inspire him ; 
and, with every faculty under perfect command, but all aflame, for an hour 
he swept along in glorious oratory: yet I can recall but one portion of this 
address, and that was a magnificent description of a Roman Triumph. 
A. A. T. 

62 



and madness of the modern fanatical abolitionism, as a cure for 
slavery/' 

'Slow these presents are to the intent that you, Thmnas 
Ehenezer Thomas, mad, modern ahoUtionist, of the Borough of 
Rossmlle, County of Butler, and State of Ohio, in view of the 
premises, he and appear at the house of me, J. W. Scott, of tlie 
Borough of Oxford, and County and State aforesaid, on the 
evening of tomorrow, being Tuesday the 20th day of FeVy. in 
the year of our Lord 18U, to tal:e a cup of tea,— or coffee as the 
case may 6e, — and thence to proceed to the First Presbyterian 
Church, with pen, ink and paper, then and there, and therewith 
(a little more than the ordinary legal phrase) to take notes of 
said aicful hull of excommunication, and handing over to Satan 
of said abolitionists and ahoUtionism ; and farther, that you 
come provided with all the necessary material in the form of 
aniti-slavery docimv&nts, which mmj be necessa/ry to form- a 
shelter to shield yourself, and friends, and cause from the 
dreadfulness, and demolishing character of the blow. And of 
this fail not, under the pains and penalties due, and in such 
cases provided. Given under our hand, in our bed-room, this 
midway beticeen Feb. 19th and Feb. 20th, 18U. 

J. W. Scott. 

FROM REV. SAMUEL CROTHERS, D. D. 

Against organizing an anti-slavery Presbytery. 

Greenfield, O., Aug. 2, 1844. 
I received a few days since a letter from Arthur B. Brad- 
ford, Darlington, Beaver Co. Pa., stating that he and Wells 
Bnshnell had been deputed by the Anti -Slavery brethren of 
Beaver Pr-esbytery, ministerial and lay, to correspond with those 
of the same stanip in this region, on our present prospects and 
duties. Probably they have written to you : if not, I will state 
briefly, that John Knox has seceded on account of slavery. Five 
of the ministers are ready to do so. "Numbers of the very best 
members of the congi-egations will go''; some have gone. They 
had understood that we were in the same state of mind, and 
intimated that they were disposed to act with us. I replied, in 
substance, that not more than two of our members, (the young- 
est), were in favor of a new organization; that our not sending 
a commissioner to the Assembly was intended to rouse the 
Assembly to do something either with slaveholders or aboli- 
tionists ; that from some past experience, we were disposed to 
think that a new organization was not advisable: it would cut 
us off from direct influence on the Presbyterian church ; it would 
drive the plow-share through our churches and Presbyteries; 
that no minister would join us except those whose congregations 

63 



are abolitionized ; it would luvite surrounding denominations to 
make inroads upon us: we would soon have shoals of applicants 
from suspected quarters desirous of acquiring a reputation for 
orthodoxy by union with Beaver, Chillicothe, etc.; and that we 
would soon find ourselves in a denomination with whom we 
could agree on no subject except the sinfulness of slavery; and 
finally, we would soon quarrel about what constitutes a good 
abolitionist. 

Yours in the best of bonds, 

S. Crothers. 

P. S. I am informed that at a large meeting at Hillsbor- 
ough yesterday, a petition was circulated by the Alumni of 
Miami University for the removal of "Dr. Junkin, D. I)., Pres- 
ident, etc. etc." The Alumni, without exception, signed, 
although many of them are anti-abolitionists. This, in connec- 
tion with the universal unwillingness in this region to send a 
a student to Oxford while he is there, shows how the tone of 
public opinion is changing. 

CALL FOR PRESBYTERIAN ANTI-SLAVERY CONVENTION, AT 

HAMILTON. OHIO. 

Rossville, August 16. 1844. 
Dr. Bailey : Please publish the following call for a convention of 
anti-slavery Presbyterians; continuing it. for a few weeks, in your paper, 
and oblige^ Yours, etc.. 

Thomas E. Thomas. 

PRESBYTERIAN ANTI-SLAVERY CONVENTION. 

An anti-slavery convention of ministers and elders connected with 
tJie Presbyterian Church. (O. S.). will be held in Hamilton. Butler 
County, Ohio, on Tuesday and Wednesday, the 17th and 18th days of 
September; commencing at 11 o'clock on Tuesday. The object of the 
convention is to deliberate upon the course proper to be pursued in 
relation to the subject of slavery, as connected with the Presbyterian 
Church. All our brethren in the ministry and eldershlj) who are opposed 
to slavery, and who think some ecclesiastical action against it necessary, 
are earnestlv invited to attend. 

Signed:" R. H. Bishop. J. W. Scott, Benj. Swan, Wm. S. Rogers, 
Th. E. Thomas, M. C. Williams. S. Crothers, H. S. Fullerton. 

Business committees of the Hamilton Anti-Slavery Convention of 
Ministers and Elders : 

1. To prepare a memorial to Synod of Cincinnati, Th. E. Thomas, 
S. Crothers. 

2. Addresses to the churches on the subject of the views of the con- 
vention. Th. E. Thomas, J. M. Stone. S. Crothers. 

3. To prei)are an anti-slavery tract, relating to the connection of 
our church with slavery, etc. Th. E. Thomas, J. M. Stone. 

4. To promote circulation of Anti-Slavery documents. Jno. W. Scott, 
Jno. S. Galloway, S. Crothers, Col. Wm. Keys. Jno. A. Meeks. 

5. To secure the establishment of an Anti-Slavery pat)er. Th. E. 
Thomas, Jno. W. Scott. S. Crothers. 

64 



6. Committee on the circulation of memorials. R. H. Bishop, Wm. 
Gage, J. M. Stone, H. S. FuUerton. Jno. S. Galloway, Adrian Aten, H. 
R. Price. 

Memorial of Anti-Slavery Ministers and Elders in the Synod of Cincin- 
nati to said Svnod, September 15, 18^4- 

To the Moderator of the Synod of Cincinnati, to meet on the third 
Thursday of September, 1844: 

The memorial of the undersigned ministers and elders of the Pres- 
byterian Church, within the bounds of the Synod of Cincinnati, respect- 
fully showeth ; 

That the General Assembly of our church is annually composed, in 
part, of ministers and elders who hold their fellow men as property, 
under a system of oppression, which deprives them of their personal 
rights, which interferes with all the divinely constituted relations, and 
which substitutes the popish abomination, Oral Instruction, for the means 
of salvation, which God has appointed and promised to bless. The 
undersigned therefore respectfully pray that a memorial be forwarded to 
the next General Assembly, earnestly beseeching them to enjoin upon the 
Presbyteries to consider, in the appointment of Commissioners to the 
General Assembly, and in the exercise of discipline, that it is the declared 
faith of the Presbyterian Church, that the voluntary enslaving of one 
part of the human family by another is a gross violation of the most 
precious and sacred rights of human nature, utterly inconsistent with 
the law of God, and totally irreconcilable with the spirit and principles 
of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 

Ministers, R. H. Bishop, Wm. Dickey, S. Crothers, J. W. Scott, Hugh 
S. Fullerton, J. M. Stone, A. Aten, Thomas E. Thomas, C. A. Hoyt, J. A. I. 
Lowes, W. S. Rogers. 

Elders, Isaac Collett, John Shepherd. Benjamin C. Swan, S. R. Mol- 
lyneaux, H. I. Curtis, Geo. A. Murray, Thomas Burnes, Thomas F. 
Purdy, Thomas Mitchell. 

TO THOMAS E. THOMAS, NEW ALBANY THEO. SEM. 

With messenger l)ringing word of Dr. Bishop's death: and, ask- 
ing him to preach his funeral sermon. 

College Hill, O., April 29, 1855. 

Our dearly beloved and revered Dr. Bishop died this morning about 
five o'clock. He preached for us last Sabbath and was able to complete 
his discourse without faltering; and continued his duties in college with 
his classes with his usual energy until Friday. He expected to resume 
his recitations Monday; but this morning, although speechless, yet all 
serene, at peace with God and with all mankind, he passed away, as if he 
had laid down to sleep. 

On behalf of the Board of Directors and of his relations and friends, 
we have dispatched the bearer, a student of the college, as a messenger 
to bear the sad tidings to you to secure your presence, and to preach his 
funeral sermon, with Dr. Scott, who will officiate with you. 

May 18th. 

I received your letter which told of your absence from home. I 
regretted the providence which prevented you from coming. Since then, 
Mrs. Bishop has been called away; just two weeks from the time he 
died, at the same hour on Sabbath morning; making her to a day the 
same age. Her remains were enclosed in a strong metallic-lined box, in 
the same manner the Doctor's had been ; the mound was opened, and she 
was placed by his side. 

65 



Perhaps you were not aware that among the items of Dr. Bishop's 
will, was one as follows : 

"I give my soul to the Redeemer, as I have often endeavored to do, 
to be received on the same condition that the thief on the cross was 
received. I give my body to the Directors of Farmer's College, to be 
enclosed in a strong box. and to be placed in a mound of earth, to be 
formed of successive layers of sand and earth ; the mound to contain a 
cubic quantity of earth at least eight feet each way." 

We were fulfilling his request in the spot designated, making a 
mound about twenty-five feet in diameter. There is to be no monument 
of an artificial character placed to designate the spot, permitting merely 
the planting of an evergreen upon it. 

Thus has gone one whose labors will not cease to have an influence 
for good, through time: and so these good old servants of the Cross, 
after their labors on earth, so ample and complete, are peacefully and 
quietly to rest together. 

TO TROFESSOR ROBERT H. BISHOP, OXFORD, OHIO. 

Dr. Thomas's heautiful letter to R. H. B. Jr. on the death of his 

father. 

New Albany, Ind., May 2, 1855. 

My dear Robert : I deeply regret that I was prevented from at- 
tending the funeral services of your dear and honored father; 
honored of thousands, but doubly dear to me; for after my 
father and mother, he did more for me than any other has done. 
In accordance with a previous engagement, I had gone to 
Indianapolis on Saturday, my wife accompanying me. We in- 
tended to return on Monday; but an unexpected alteration of 
the train table detained us; we reached home on the afternoon 
of Tuesday, and then received the message from College Hill. 
Of course the interment had taken place before that time, and 
I was 150 miles distant. I need not express my sorrow at the 
disappointment, nor say how much gratification it would have 
afforded me (a mournful pleasure indeed) to be able to add my 
humble tribute to the memory of one so loved, so honored, so 
worthy of affection and reverence. But Providence has other- 
wise ordered ; and he, our sainted father, needed no tribute from 
me, or from any mortal. His record is on high; his memorial, 
on earth too, abideth forever. A long life faithfully spent in 
an illustrious service of his Divine Master has left a thousand 
testimonials of his fidelity, ability and success. I would express 
my deep and tender sympathy with you and your family, espe- 
cially with your honored and now desolate mother; but I know 
from recent experience, how vain are words to express emotions, 
and how utterly useless are phrases of condolence in allaying 
grief of heart. There is but one Physician who can heal heart 
wounds. He is as near to you and yours as to me; and I doubt 
not you enjoy His refreshing cordials. You know that God has 
been pleased to call home our youngest child, a bright and beau- 
tiful, and most promising boy of almost three years. Many a 

66 



cherished hope of ours has thus been crushed forever! But we 
know Who gave, and Who has taken away; we know that our 
bud of earthly promise blooms now in the Paradise of God. 
Ebbie has learned already, in the infant school of that better coun- 
try, more than his father will ever learn on earth. And if I cannot 
lament the departure of one who had just crossed the threshold 
of time, shall I mourn, shall you mourn, the peaceful exit of 
him whose fourscore years had finished his earthly work, and 
matured him for the loftier service of the upper sanctuary? I 
remember his parting words to our class, (1834) — "When next 
we meet, we shall be roaming and praising in the better country."' 
Venerable father! may we be so happy as to realize the hope, 
and meet thee, all meet thee, in thine home in heaven. 

I shall be happy to hear from you the particulars of your 
father's last days, so soon as it may be convenient and agreeable. 
I hope, before long, to be able to pay you a visit. Till then, 
accept the assurance of unabated and unalterable affectfion 
from 

Your old friend, 

Thomas E. Thomas. 



67 



Ill 

FROM REV. HUGH S. FULLERTON. 

The Deliverance of the Assanhly of 18^5 on Slavehohling. "Why 
— / can't stand it." 

South Salem, O., July 22, 1845. 

The report of our Assembly is unutterably abominable. The 
more I examine it, the more offensive it seems to me. In accord- 
ance with a resolution of our session, I commenced a review of 
it with the design of forwarding it to your Magazine for publi- 
cation. The review is written and has been adopted by 
session ; but it is too long for you, unless broken up into several 
numbers; and it has been delayed so long by my sickness that 
we have concluded to print it at Greenfield. As soon as it is 
done, I will send you a copy. It is the request of the session 
that you would publish it; but this matter, of course, we wish 
to be left to your discretion. Perhaps you will think best to 
insert parts of it. But my impression is that, since you have 
laken up the matter, you had better write on in your own way. 

Woodrow don't like the report of the Assembly. It is an 
apology for slaveholding. It must indeed be a nauseous dose 
when ills pro-slavery stomach can't bear it. Rev. S. Brown of 
Zanesville, preached a sermon a few Sabbaths ago, in defense 
of the report. A friend, whose statements are fully to be relied 
on, heard him. He said over and over that if the relation was 
from hell, the church had no right to interfere with it, for it 
was allowed in the church of its King and Head. He made a 
new application of one of the Assembly's princii)les, viz : we are 
bound by a covenant engagement not to turn out slaveholders. 
It was this. Even the state governments have no right to abolish 
slavery. It is a domestic institution. The governments were 
formed on the conceded principle that they had no right to inter- 
fere with domestic arrangements. To abolish slavery would be 
to violate their compacts with every slaveholder! If the prin- 
ciple is correct, his reasoning is good. What sinners those states 
are which have abolished slavery. 

I feel as you do on the subject of secession. I have always 
opposed it strongly. But if the church, either by her action, or 
inaction, sanctions the Assembly's doctrines, why — why — why I 
can't stand it. But let us not be in too great haste. Let us do 

68 



all we can to correct the sentiment and action of the church. A 
faithful and patient advocacy of our principles will at least give 
us friends, and extend our ranks if we have to go. I love our 
church. It is like death to part with her. But if she has taken 
her final stand on this subject, 1 can say "the bitterness of death 
is past." 

Have you read Father Rice's essay called "Slavery Incon- 
sistent with Justice and Good Policy?'' If not, you will find it 
in Rice's memoirs, by Dr. Bishop. I do wish we could republish 
it. His name is a host. And it would show that the abolition- 
ism of 1792 was much like that of 1845, 

Rev. Dr. Hugh 8. FuUerton; his life; education; service; chil- 
dren. Founded Salem Academy, one of the best in the 
State. Long at Salem, 0. What he built up there. His 
life-long friendship for Dr. Thomas. His anti-slavery activ- 
ity. Dies when his five sons were in uniform. 

Note. Rev. Hugh S. Fullerton, D. I)., of Scotch-Irish de- 
scent, and the second of eleven children of Thomas and Eliza- 
beth (Stew^art) Fullerton, was born near Greencastle, Pa., in 
1805. In 1815 the family removed to Fayette County, Ohio; 
where Hugh S. grew up in the severe labor of farm life. Having 
joined the Presbyterian Church at Bloomington, then under the 
pastoral care of Rev. Wm. Dickey, he was taken under the care 
of the Chillicothe Presbytery in preparing for the ministry; 
attended a year at Ohio University ; and then began his theolog- 
ical studies under Dr. Samuel Crothers at Greenfield, Ohio. His 
first pastorate was Union Church, four miles from Chillicothe; 
and while there he was married to Dorothy B., daughter of Rev. 
Wm. Boies. In 1832, he removed to Chillicothe; and, at the age 
of twenty-seven, "threw himself with ardoi- into the anti-slavery 
movement, then just beginning throughout the country." This 
region was largely settled by families from Virginia nnd Ken- 
tucky, and among them were large numbers of emancipated 
slaves. They had no schools and scarcely any religious teaching. 
Mr. Fullerton obtained for them as teacher, a young lady from 
Northern Ohio, of cultivated mind and high social position. 
When her mission was known, it was impossible to get her a 
place to board. Mr. Fullerton then took her into his own house- 
hold. The ladies of his church and neighborhood took offense, 
and sent a committee to "remonstrate against his harboring a 
nigger school-teacher!" 

In 1838, Rev. Mr. F, accepted a call to the Salem Church, 
Ross County, Ohio, lately vacated by Rev. J as. Dickey, after a 
pastorate of nearly thirty years; and here, and until his death, 
he spent twenty-six years of a laborious life. About 500 persons 
were added to this' church during his ministry. A large and 

69 



commodious place of worship was erected. Mr. Fullerton found- 
ed the Salem Academy, one of the best institutions of its kind 
in the State. "It was a vine of his own planting, and to him it 
was a great delight when he saw fruit ripening upon it, or when 
the odor of its bloom filled the neighborhood with fragrance." 
More than forty young men, studying for the ministry, were 
under his care as their pastor and teacher. 

Dr. Fullerton was the father of six children. Artemas T. 
supplies his father's vacant pulpit; George H., educated at 
Salem Academy, Miami University and Princteon Seminary, was 
Chaplain of the 1st Ohio Infantry, which went from Dayton; 
has been pastor at Lancaster, Lane Seminary, Springfield, 111.. 
and is now at Springfield, O. ; another son, Thomas, was Chap- 
lain of the 17th Ohio Infantry, has been pastor at Walnut Hills, 
O., Professor of Rhetoric in Wooster University ; pastor at Erie, 
Pa., and is now at Georgetown, D. C. The younger sons, Hugh 
S., and Erskine B., were officers in the army. 

Among the good fortunes of Dr. Fullerton was the privilege 
of remaining long in one spot. The energy and activities which 
Dr. Thomas scattered at Hamilton, at Hanover, in the cause 
of the Seminaries, at Dayton, and at last at Lane Seminary, 
Hugh S. Fullerton concentrated at one place; and they made a 
household and influence known and notable. Rev. Dr. Gal- 
breath has described a Christmas dinner there, ''when for some 
time they enjoyed, by way of anticipation, the great bird which 
the head of the house had skillfully fed and fattened, parading 
about with bearded breast and feathers glittering in the sun- 
light; with metallic shades of black, and dark green, and deep, 
golden bronze, and head hooded with scarlet." When Dr. Ful- 
lerton, on Christmas Eve, going out at the head of a little proces- 
sion of boys, took an axe and took its head off, his tender sensi- 
bilities were aroused, and he exclaimed, "Poor fellow; we have 
treated you badly!" "I don't know," replied Tom; "at least, in 
his death he has had the benefit of the clergy." 

Rev. George H. Fullerton has written : "Dr. Thomas was my 
father's friend, and I was taught as a little boy in my home at 
South Salem, to reverence him. The two men sympathized 
deeply in their anti-slavery sentiments ; and I remember how my 
father, returning from Synod or General Assembly, would tell 
us with flashing eye of eloquence of Dr. T. while pleading for 
the slave, or confronting the representatives of the slave power." 

The two men were much alike: they probably never differed 
on anything, after a few moments for consultation. To meet 
Dr. Fullerton, but casually, was always, to my father, a renewal 
of inspiration. Together they went to the General Assembly at 
Philadelphia, in 1846, determined to reverse the notorious act 
of the preceding year, and wholly failed. F>ut they did procure 
the adoption of this resolution : 

70 



"Resolved, that in the judgment of this House, the action of the 
General Assembly of 1845 was not intended to deny or rescind the testi- 
mony often offered by the General Assemblies previous to that date." 

(Note. The act of 181S against slavery was reported by Dr. Ashbel 
Green, Dr. George A. Baxter, and Rev. Dyer Burgess who was from 
Miami Presbytery. The act of 1845 bears the impress of the hand of 
Dr. Chas. Hodge, although reported by Dr. N. L. Rice. Against 168 
yeas in its favor were recorded thirteen nays, who were: Stephen Bliss, 
"jno. C. Eastman, Adam B. Gilliland, James McKean. A. S. MacMaster, 
Varnuni Noyes. James Robertson and Jno. D. Whethaue, Ministers; and 
Archibald Barton. Hugh Gaston, Samuel E. Hibben. Ezekiel Miller and 
Matthias C. Williams, Elders. The resolution stated above as obtained 
in 1846 was of the first importance, in that it permitted men like Dr. 
Fullerton to remain in the church, and in fact prevented a disruption 
on the slavery question.) 

Dr. Hugh S. Fiillei'ton was not permitted to see the end of 
the great anti-slavery coutiict in which he had long born so 
efficient and honorable part. While all his sons were in uniform, 
he passed away on August 17, 1862. 

FROM REV. WILLIAM DICKEY. 

Slavery in Tennessee. 

Bloomingburgh, Ohio, July 23, 1845. 
Has the anti-slavery cause injured the condition of the slaves? 
Surely not. In my late 'journey through Kentucky and Tennessee. I did 
not see one dirty, ragged negro. The squads of little negroes which I 
used to see, naked as the pigs and calves with which they gamboled in 
the shade of the same grove, were now clad like human beings in shirt 
and pants or slips, and many of them had straw bats, such as my own 
little boys put on : nor did I see as formerly, boys and girls waiting at 
the table, in a state of stark nudity. 

I was happy to acknowledge that a great change had taken place 
since I was conversant about Nashville fifty-five years ago, when negroes 
vrere naked and ignorant. I said I was pleased to see so much attention 
paid to their bodies and their minds: and I wished that the people of 
Tennessee might go far ahead of the people of Ohio in good offices to the 
negro. God speed you. dear friends, in this work. But, said I. brethren 
where does all this come from? Where is the root of these efforts to im- 
prove the condition of the slaves? Will you find it in the South? Never, 
no never ! Well, we will have to go North— yes. three hunderd and sixty 
miles north, across the big river, we will find the occasion of these 
noble efforts. It will be found in that despised association cMlled the 
Anti-Slavery Society. That soceity had made some shocking disclosures 
respecting the degradation of the slaves in the South, and you have 
determined that they shall not all be true much longer. And this thing 
is not to stop here: these people will read on, and find, at length, that 
they are men. And what then? And what then? 
Yours in the best of bonds. 

Wm. Dickey. 

Rev. Dr. Wm. Dickey; his life; sweetness of character. 

Note. Rev. William Dickey, or Father Dickey, as he was 
commonly known, was the son of Robert and Margaret (Hill- 

71 



house) Dickey, and was born in South Carolina, whence, when 
a cliild. his father's family were conipolled to flee before Corn- 
wallis's army, which despoiled his {grandfather's farm. Soon 
after, his father emigrated to Southern Kentucky, where William 
jjrew up, and passed his first seventeen years as a Presbyterian 
nsinister. He removed to Fayette County, Ohio, and in 1817 
oruanized the Presbyterian Church at Bloomingburg, over which 
he remained as pastor for the next forty years. Hia first wife 
was Rebecca Ross from Nashville, Tenn., his second wife was 
Ellen Ghormly, of Greenfield, Ohio, and he was the father 
of fourteen children. One son. Rice, died at Miami University 
while preparing for the ministry. He was a brother-in-law of 
Dr. Samuel Crothers, and a half-brother of Rev. Dr. James H. 
Dickey. He was buried on his 83rd birth-day, December 6, 1857. 

Dr. Crothers said "he never knew any other man of whom 
so numy anecdotes would be remembered. He went to the Gen- 
eral Assembly at Philadelphia, in a suit of homespun ; and being 
invited to preach to a large city congregation was stopped at the 
pulpit entrance by the sexton, who said, 'Only ministers are 
allowed to go up there!' " 

His sermons were peculiar; but at times would burn and 
flame up into almost inspired speech, l^r. Galbraith writes: 
"He was a modest man, easily touched, of most tender sensibili- 
ties. It was not, however, always safe to presume too much on 
his forbearance. When he was old and feeble, he preached once 
in a church that had a choir in the gallery, that sang with art 
and skill, and was accompanied or led by instruments of music. 
He announced and read a long hymn for the first one, and the 
choir took the liberty of singing only a })art of it. For the second 
hymn, he chose one that had but two verses, of four lines each ; 
deliberately and reverently he read it, and then lifted that great 
face and turned his innocent eyes up toward the choir, and with 
voice soft as velvet, said: 'The choir will please sing all of this,' " 

Like Gilliland, at Red Oak; and Rankin, at Ripley; and 
("rothers, at Greenfield ; and Fullerton, at Salem, and Steele, at 
Hillsboro, William Dickey made his own home, and congregation 
and community; and to them and for them he spoke as he 
pleased ; and like each of these men he was an early and staunch 
pillar of Presbyterian Abolitionism. — A. A. T, 



FROM REV, DR. SAMUEL CROTHERS. 

TJie Assembly of 18^5 on Slavery. 

I received last week yours of the Gth instant, I was anxiously 
looking for it; and I have so many things to say in reply that I 
scarcely know where to begin. As regards contribution for Magazine, 
it is probable that most of the brethren, like myself, were not aware that 



72 



the editor desired them. After the appearanc of the forthcoming number, 
I shall endeavor to furnish something on the compromising spirit of 
slaveholding Christianity as exhibited in the Assembly's decision. I was 
surprised by that decision. But I do rejoice they b.-.ve come out honestly 
with their principles. P^verybody now knows where they stand ; and I 
should as soon expect a connnunity of black-legs to maintain a respectable 
standing during the millenium as an ecclesiastical body to flourish after 
such a shameful avowal of proslavery principles, under the light that is 
now shining around them. 

My own opinion decidedly is that we. in this region, will be better 
off by sending no further commissioners to the General Assembly. At 
the same time, perhaps your Presbytery ought to pursue the course that 
you suggest. Perhaps diversity of sentiment and position in this matter 
will have a better influence tlian entire unanimity. 

Fullerton writes well. If you suggest it to him, he will contribute 
something to the Magazine worth reading. 

TO ADAMS JEWETT, M. D. 

Will lecture in Dayton, on the ^'Biblical View of Slavery" 

Rossville, 20 August, 1845. 
As to your proposal to visit Dayton and deliver a lecture or 
two on the Biblical View of Slavery, it would highly gratify 
me to be able to comply with your wishes. I shall address a 
convention at Ripley on the 26th and 27th. On the 30th, I 
shall probably be at Xenia ; though I am not yet informed of the 
time for their anniversary of the County Society. After that, I 
shall be able, should nothing unforseen prevent, to find leisure 
for spending a few days at Dayton. 

FROM REV. HUGH S. FULLERTON, D. D. 
Going to the Assemhly in Philadelphia. 

Near Greenfield, O., December 11, 1845. 
Dear Brother: I hoped to meet you at Synod, but could 
not leave home at the time of the meeting. I am glad to hear 
that you have had a pleasant session ; and to find that you feel 
encouraged. T try hard to feel so myself, and sometimes succeed 
for a little while; but alas! the very next wave goes over me. 
If our brethren who oppose us on the slave question would have 
the magnanimity to acknowledge the pro-slaveryism of the As- 
sembly's report, I would think we had grounds of hope. But 
when I see them attempting to patch up its filthy rags, and 
s}»rinkle sweet odors its stench, smelling rank to heaven, I feel 
cast down. But after all there is one cheering fact. They are 
evidently ashamed of its plain meaning. And yet. I almost de- 
spair of the next Assembly's doing anything to correct the pro- 
ceedings of the last. The slaveholders feel that they have 
achieved a triumph, and they know how to profit by it. I have 
conversed with two men who have been in different slave states 

73 



since the meeting of the Assembly ; they both assure me that the 
thing pleases slaveholders extremely well. And from all I can 
learn from the South, I believe the report is understood there just 
as abolitionists in the North have understood it, and that it was 
intended by many members of the Assembly to be a repeal of our 
former testimonies against slavery. Perhaps 1 look on the dark 
side, and maj' be mistaken. Time will determine. 

If I understand Rice & Co., they have changed their ground. 
All they defend now is simply the legal relation, and that only 
until it can be destroyed with safety to the slave. This I believe 
to be the ground that will hereafter be taken pretty generally at 
the North. But my fear is that they are taking it merely to 
avoid odium and the force of our arguments, and not with the 
view of taking any efficient action for the purpose of purging the 
church of slavery by the exercise of discipline upon those who 
"persist in maintaining and justifying it." 

I am glad to hear that you expect to be sent to the next 
Assembly. I have been nominated as the delegate from our 
Presbytery. I look forward to the meeting with great anxiety. 
If the Assembly, either by action or inaction, should ratify the 
proceedings of the last, our churches will go. 

Truly your brother, 

Hugh S. Fullerton. 



Who controlled Assemhli/ of ''i5 on its Slaven/ Deliverance? 

Note. Rev. Dr. J. H. Thornwell of South Carolina, a dele- 
gate to this assembly, wrote to his wife : 

Cincinnati, May 1!), 1845. 

"The question of slavery has been before the house, and referred 
to a special committee of seven. Though not a member of the committee, 
I have been consulted on the subject, and have drawn up a paper, which 
I think the committee and the Assembly will substantially adopt ; and 
if they do, abolitionism will be killed in the Presbyterian Church, at 
least for the present. I have no doubts but that the Assembly, by a very 
large majority, will declare slavery not to be sinful ; will assert that it 
is sanctioned by the Word of God ; that it is purely a civil relation, with 
which the church, as such, has no right to interfere ; and that abolition- 
ism is essentially wicked, disorganizing and ruinous. I feel perfectly 
satisfied that this is the stand which the Assembly will take. The 
southern members have invited discussion, and they will triumphantly 
gain the day. It will be a great matter to i)ut the agitations on slavery 
at rest, and to save the church from dismemberment and schism ; and 
particularly to do it here, in the stronghold of abolitionism." 

"P. S. The committee did not adopt my report fully on slavery, but 
will bring in one that takes nearly the same position ; one which vindi- 
cates the South, and will put the question at rest." * 

* Life of Thornwell, by Palmer, page 286. 

74 



FROM HON. JOHN WOODS, AUDITOR OF OIHO. 

One effect of Dr. Junkin's argument. Who John Woods of 

Hamilton urns. 

Columbus, October 18. 1&45. 

My dear Sir : I have received and glanced over the six numbers of 
your magazine. The mechanical work is not well executed. This always 
detracts from the pleasure of reading a book. 

I trust that you will go on your way prospering. There is a great 
necessity for waking up the churches upon the subject of slavery. I 
confess I am astonished at the death-like stupor which has come over 
Christians on this subject, especially the ministers of the gospel of light 
and liberty. The doctrine and preaching of siich men as .Tunkin and 
Rice will do more to spread, to sow broad-cast, to give root and strength 
to bold infidelity and a disbelief in the Word of God than all the argu- 
ments that ever were advanced in the name of infidelity by her avowed 
disciples. 

Does not every man know in this intelligent age. — it is not necessary 
to argue the subject, — there is a monitor in his breast which makes him 
feel that slavery is a monstrous evil ; that the system which countenances, 
permits, tolerates it. — use what soft word you will, — is false, and at war 
with moral truth and natural right. If the church does not see and feel 
this, the world will. If the Bible does not condemn this system, the 
Bible is not true and does not contain a pure and holy law given to man 
by his Creator. This will be the judgment of those who see and know 
and feel the degrading, corrupting influences of the system. Who has 
read Junkin's arguments, and such as his. to prove that the Bible 
"tolerates" slavery, that did not feel the whole force and weight of their 
arguments — if force and weight they had — to bear directly against the 
Bible and Christianity. 

You cannot convince men that slavery is right : there is too much 
moral light in the world for that ; but you may succeed in making many 
doubt whether the Bible itself is true. And this is the work which 
these ministers of the gospel are performing. This truth is laid upon 
the human heart by the impress of Heaven, that he who holds his fel- 
low-man as a slave is guilty of a wrong ; and he who attempts to falsify 
this truth by an appeal to the Bible, attempts to prove that the Bible 
is not the Word of God. 

If the church. — all the true churches, — had stood united upon the 
right side, the moral force thus retained would have been great. But her 
voice is no longer heard. She has been disarmed, and her valiant men, 
many of them, have been taken captive. 

Note. Hon. John Woods was born in Pennsylvania in 1794, 
and was of Scotch-Irish stock. He came, when a child, with his 
parents to Warren County, Ohio; and as a practicino^ lawyer, 
throughout his life, he lived and died at Hamilton, Ohio. He was 
in Congress from 1825 to 1829; then edited and published "The 
Hamilton Intelligencer:" from 1845 to 1851 he was Auditor of 
State, and is said to have left 'an indelible mark on the policy 
and history of Ohio.' He was a man of intense and restless 
energy: he died in 1855, aged 61. 

FROM REV. R. H. BISHOP. D. D. 
TJdnks the Lord is kind to him. 

Pleasant Hill, January 11. 1S46. 
My dear Friend : I consider it my duty and privilege to say to you 

75 



that the Tvord is exceedingly kind to me. Our new enterprise has suc- 
ceeded thus far well, and is in everything as promising as could have 
been desired, or at least expected. 

As to myself. I have a Bible recitation every day In which I get some 
new views of Scripture history and Scripture doctrine almost daily. The 
young men also are generally attentive and appear contented. And indeed I 
never, in any former period of my life, have been connected with as 
many i)romising young men as now are in attendance here. 

I hope you continue to remember us in your best devotional hours. 
The communion and influence of saints can in this way be enjoyed to 
any extent; can be carried all round the globe, and into every class 
of society. 

I hope the I^ord will continue also to direct and support and pros- 
per you in every portion of the great and good work in which you are 
engaged. The time to favor Zion. even the set time is certainly near at 
hand: our King is preparing His instrument. His great conciuering army; 
and happy will the young man be. or that man in middle life, who shall 
rightly understand the nature of that warfare, and the right use of the 
proper means which must be and which shall be used. 

I was pleased to see your name on the synodical committee respect- 
ing the proposed college. I hope you will not be an inactive or inefficient 
member of that committee. Whatever may be the final conclusion, the 
whole subject ought now to be fully and openly, for some months, atten- 
tively considered. I hope you will be able also to make your arrange- 
ments so as to be with us here, a few days, at the close of our session. 

Sincerely yours, 

R. H, Bishop. 

FROM REV. HUGH S. FULLERTON. 

A new religious paper needed. 

South Salem, Ohio, March 1. 1847. 
I am very glad to find from your letter that the idea of a 
new paper has not been abandoned. I was afraid that Rice and 
Wilson would make the Presbyterian of the West so strong that 
it would be vain to attem])t the starting of another paper in our 
region. Two or three numbers that fell into my hands last week, 
allayed this fear. I find that it is a dry concern; and thjit it 
holds on in its old course. I am much pleased with your views 
of what our paper ought to be. Ever since our meeting of Synod 
in Springfield, in the Fall of '41, I have insisted on it that we 
abolitionists have done our cause an injury by confining the dis- 
cussion of the slave question to one single point — the sinfulness 
of the relation itself. I feel more than ever convinced that on 
this point we are right; that William Pitt spake nothing but the 
truth when he said "slavery is incurable injustice." At the same 
time, I believe with Chalmers that there are many other points 
from which slavery may be successfully and triumphantly at- 
tacked. And I ampersiiaded that if we could bring to bear upon 
the public mind fact and principles apart from the truth that 
the relation is essentially sinful, slavery might be overthrown; 
or, at least, that the mind might be prepared for the ultimate re- 
ception of this doctrine. Paul fed Thristians at Corinth 

76 



with milk and not vvitli meat because they were not able to bear 
it, being babes. We have taken a different course. Although 
called on to administer to the wants of a community of babes, 
as far as this question is concerned, we have discarded to a great 
degree, the use of milk. We have placed l>efore them the whole 
tub full of meat, and have re(iuired them to eat it at once or else 
to suffer themselves to be denounced as the enemies of that which 
is good. Thus we have been neither as wise as serpents nor as 
''harmless" as a dove. By this I do not mean to say that the 
essential sinfulness of slavery should be kept out of view in any 
paper we may conduct; but what I mean to say is this, while 
slavery should not be the prominent thing in a religious paper, 
the sinfulness of the thing itself should not be the exclusive, 
or even prominent topic in our discussion of this question. But, 
brother, I desire such a paper as you propose, not only for the 
sake of the anti-abolitionists, but also for the abolitionists them- 
selves. The most of them have become disgusted with our relig- 
ious papers, and have ceased taking them. The consequence is 
that they read no papers but those devoted exclusively to the 
slave question. This is very unfavorable to the development of 
Christian character. It unavoidably leads to ultraism on this 
one point. This one thing absorbs the mind and heart, to the 
exclusion of other things necessary to their usefulness and 
growth in grace. If religious papers conducted on proper prin- 
ciples had been circulated through the religious community, 
secession would not have been talked of, much less resorted to, 
and we would be spared the i)ain of witnessing those scenes of 
fanaticism and apostacy which have disgraced not only the anti- 
slavery cause, but also the cause of our common Christianity. 

"'My heart breaketh for the longing it hath" for such a 
paper as you propose. I verily believe that nothing will be so 
well calculated, under God, to save our church from the sin of 
slavery, and from the judgments of heaven. Silver and gold have 
I none, but such as I have shall be freely given to its support. 
Whenever it is thought desirable to make the effort, T will devote 
all the time I can possibly spare to the furtherance of the project. 
It will meet with much favor in this region. Give my kind 
regards to your family. 

Truly your brother, 

H. S. FULLBRTON. 

p. s.— It seems to me that we should leave no lawful effort untried, 
which might redeem the Presbyterian Church from the foul reproach cast 
upon it by the last General Assembly. I cannot believe the Presbyterian 
Church was organized on a compromise with slaveholders ; nor can I be- 
lieve that our Lord and his Apostles held fellowship with them. I believe 
both were slandered by the last Assembly. 

77 



Rev. Dr. J as. H. Dickey, father of Gen. T. Lyle Dickey of Illinois. 
Sketch of his life and anti-slavery service at Ripley, 0. 

Note. Rev. James H. Dickey, born in 'N'ii'uini.K in 17<S0, was 
a half brother of Rev. Wm. I>i<key, afterwards ]on<; of Rlooming- 
burgh, O.; and was the son of Robert and Mary Henry Dickey, 
who, at the close of the Revolutionary War, removed from South 
Carolina to Gerrard Co., Ky. 

As he grew to manhood, James H. had meagre opportunities 
for education, but was licensed to preach in 1808. He spent some 
years travelling as a domestic missionary in Tennessee, Kentucky, 
Ohio, and Indiana. He married Mary Depew who lived near 
Paris, Ky., and whose sister married Dr. Samuel Crothers, of 
Greenfield, O. ; and in 1810 became settled as pastor over the 
"congregation of Buckskin," afterwards South Salem, Ohio. In 
charge of this church and a member of the famous Chillicothe 
Presbytery, he remained for the next twenty-six years. In 1837, 
he removed to and became pastor of the church at Union Grove, 
Putnam Co., Illinois, in the Peoria Presbytery. Here he con- 
tinued to preach for the next sixteen years. In 1856, when sev 
ent\ -six years old, "as a man goes to sleep," he passed away. 

T. Lyle Dickey, of Ottawa, a distinguished officer on the 
staff of Gen. Grant, and subsequently Judge of the Supreme 
Court of Illinois, was his son: a daughter is the wife of Rev. 
Samuel M. Templeton, of Delavan, 111. The late Jno. M. Dickey, 
of Indiana, was his cousin ; Judge Alfred S. Dickey, of South 
Salem, O., and Rev. Dr. Claudius B. H. Martin, nephews. 

Born a southerner, and reared in a slave state, James H. 
Dickey preached against slavery while yet in Kentucky; set free 
the slaves who fell to himself and his wife by inheritance, and 
was one of the earliest, most influential, and active of Presby- 
terian Ohio abolitionists ; indeed, as an anti-slavery man, he was 
known throughout the country. No man did more in the early 
organization of abolition sentiment. In the contest that arose 
in the church over the biblical sanction of slavery, he was fore- 
most in the field. One of the curious books of abolition literature 
is "A Review of a Summary of Biblical Antiquities, compiled 
for the use of Sabbath School Teachers, by Jas. H. Dickey, Pastor 
of the Church at Salem. Ripley. Published by the Abolition 
Society of Paint Valley, 1834." I quote the following from its 
pages. — A. A. T. 

"That slavery is an evil grievous to be borne, is everywhere allowed. 
That to hold a fellow creature in bondage is cruel and unjust, is generally 
admitted. And yet I know of no sin so generally pleaded for. and by 
such able advocates. The philosopher, the moralist, the politician, the 
historian, the archaeologist, the commentator, the theologian, the humble 
writer for the Sabbath school, all. all are laid under contribution to 
furnish something to the slaveholder to enable him to parry the thrusts 
of conscience, and evade the claims of right. One discovers that right 



and wrong has nothing to do with settling the order of society, and 
establishing the relations of life; but only with duties pertaining to 
relations previously established. Another has guessed that claims 
founded on usurpation and injustice, become good and valid only by 
being long persisted in. A third has found out that the Patriarchs and 
especially Abraham, the friend of God. were slaveholders. And they 
were very good men. A fourth has found out that God, iu the law which 
he gave to Moses, permitted the Jews to put away their wives ; a thing 
that was wrong ; because of the hardness of their hearts. And hence 
assuredly gather that the good Lord will grant slaveholders a little 
indulgence : and permit them, because their hearts also are hard to 
hold their slaves and live on the gains of oppression. A fifth class prove 
from the very silence of Christ and his Apostles, that slaveholding, 
though a sin, and manifestly contrary to the spirit of the Gospel, is 
nevertheless a privileged sin, which must not be reproved unless it is 
done in general terms ; and that very prudently, and so as not to disturb 
the conscience of anyone. There is not another sin in all the black 
catalogue of transgressions which has so many and so able advocates." 

FROM REV. JOHN M. STEVENSON, D. D. 

Difficulties of a new paper. 

Cincinnati, March 31, 1847. 

I need not say to you that I am deeply interested in the project of 
a new paper ; although I have had little opportunity to show that interest. 
It has scarcely been out of my mind a half day since I saw you ; and, 
among some encouraging thoughts, many doubts and difficulties have 
obtruded themselves. Let me state some of them, with the hope that it 
will only tend to start us securely when we do get under way. 

1st. Of that mad dog cry "Abolition". Now my dear brother, I 
know you won't judge me for sympathizing in it ; but I know of its 
existence, too sadly ubiquitous. Your prominent and successful conflict 
with Dr. Junkin has made your name, — may I say it without flattery, — 
widely known. And yet there are some things in said "Review", and 
in your written and spoken sentiments since; especially the transactions 
of a Convention at Pittsburg last Spring, that can be. and will be 
brought out against you and the paper, if you stand as the editor in the 
outset. Don't you think .so? If aye, what can be done to avoid the 
difl5culty? 

Note. Rev. John M. Stevenson, D. D., was born in 1812; 
attended Miami University in 1832, and was graduated at Jef- 
ferson College in 1836, He attended Lane Seminary and was a 
tutor in Kenyon College ; and, in 1841, was professor of Greek in 
Ohio University. In 1841, he became pastor of the Presbyterian 
Church at Troy, Ohio; and then was general agent in the west 
for the American Tract Society. In 1849, he became pastor of 
the Presbyterian Church in New Albany, Tnd., whence he was 
called to be Secretary of the Tract Society in New York City, 
which position he has filled for thirty-four years, and in which 
city he still resides. Of his children, a daughter, Rosa, is the 
wife of President Patton of Princeton College. 

During the j>eriod covered by this correspondence, and more 
especially from 1840 to 18G0, few men were more actively useful, 

79 



or, indeed, influential in the Presbyterian Church in the West 
than John M. Stevenson. Always a firm and outspoken anti- 
slavery man^ he had a practical business sagacity, which his 
friends, Drs. MacMaster and Thomas, greatly needed in the tasks 
they undertook, and which was always recognized among the 
trustees of Miami University, of Hanover College and of New 
Albany Theological Seminary. He deserves an honored place 
among Ohio Presbyterian Abolitionists. — A. A. T. 

mOM REV. D. K. MCDONALD. EDITOR OF THE PRESBYTERIAN 

OF THE WEST. 

Cannot discuss slavery in Ms paper. Aholitionists '^cannot ride 
into society in his most genteel company". 

Ciucinuatl, May 5, 1846. 
Bro. Thomas : 

I received your letter of the 2Stb April, making some inquiries, in 
a confidential way, as to my views of the necessity and propriety of 
discussing the subject of slavery in the religious papers of our church; 
and whether I thought the Presbyterian of the West could be pur- 
chased for that object. 

My opinion is that our religious newspapers act wisely in leaving 
the subject of slavery to be discussed in other ways, and through other 
mediums. This being my view. I would of course oppose the sale of 
this paper for the purpose of making it a public combatant on the sub- 
ject of slavery in our church ; and thus turn it from its original and 
present design of being a peaceful and useful messenger to our people, 
without embroiling them in continual strife with each other. I sincerely 
hope that the great body of those in our church who long to see our Zion 
arise and shine, and the cause of God abundantly prospering among us, 
desire to see the paper move forward in neutral, quiet, wise course on 
this subject which it has hitherto pursued, without entering into the 
merits of the question pro or con. If the parties to either side of this 
question wish to discuss it through the public prints, the way is open to 
them to establish periodicals for that pux-pose. to advocate and extend 
their peculiar views. Surely a paper established and sustained upon 
known principles, will not turn aside from those principles to take up tlie 
hobby of every individual that might wish to ride into society in the 
most* genteel company, to agitate, distract and divide. * * * 

If you have special messages to the people; if you wish to enlighten 
them with your peculiar views, you must tind some other messenger 
than the Presbyterian of the West. 

Who most genteel and influential Preshyterian company was 
in Cincinnati in 18-^6. Rev. Josh L. Wilson; his son Rev. 
Dr. Satnl. R. Wilson et al. Sketch of their lives and influ- 
ence. One man's protest. Who was he? 

NoTK. The Presbyterian paper in Cincinnati was now under 
the influence of Dr. J. L. Wilson and his son. Rev. Joshua L. 
Wilson, D. D., was born in Bedford County, Va., in 1774. His 
father, a physician, dying when the son was four years old, his 
mother removed to Kentucky, where, until he was twenty-two 

80 



years old, he received only such education as she herself could 
give him. He then studied under Rev. James Vance, in whose 
school near Louisville he also taught. He became pastor of the 
church at Bardstown, Ky., and in 1808, removed to Cincinnati, 
where he became and remained for the next thirty-eight years, 
pastor of the First Presbyterian Church. Dr. Wilson was a man 
often likened to Andrew Jackson; of intense character; marked 
ability and a great controversialist. In 1835, he led the prose- 
cution of Rev. Dr. Lyman Beecher, for heresy; and he was the 
most active minister in the West in forcing the disruption of the 
Presbyterian Church, which took place in 1838. He took a 
prominent part in public affairs, and published many volumes of 
sermons and addresses, chiefly controversial. One of his sons, 
the Rev. Dr. Sam'l R. Wilson, followed his father in the pastorate 
of the First Church in Cincinnati; was perhaps of even more 
ability, activity, and influence in the Presbyterian organization 
than his father, and was probably the most decided pro-slavery 
man in that church in the North, if he may fairly be said to have 
been of the North. Although the anti-slavery cause had not made 
much headway until Dr. Joshua L. Wilson had passed the prime 
of his life and activity, he was for nearly forty years, within the 
Presbyterian Church, a stout champion of the cause of American 
slavery, and on free soil. He always preached biblical sanction 
for human slavery as it existed in this country. We quote from 
a discourse delivered in Cincinnati in 1839, on ''Relation and 
Duties of Servants and Masters" : 

Note. To the discourse of Dr. Joshua L. Wilson I shall take 
the responsibility of giving this title 

PRESBYTERIANISM IN ITS DEGRADATION 

"After the destruction of the old world and the release of 
Noah and his family from the ark, we have a short, but mournful 
account of a transaction which has left a blot upon the character 
of the patriarch and stampt upon a portion of his posterity the 
seal of degradation. * * * * Noah became a husbandman, plant- 
ed a vineyard, and in process of time became intoxicated, by 
drinking wine. Ham, one of his sons, the father of Canaan, wick- 
edlv exposed his father's shame to his brethren, Shem and Jap- 
het'h. They, with filial affection and respect, in the most delicate 
manner, protected their venerable parent from further mockery, 
and administered a merited rebuke to their depraved brother. 
But God who saw the end from the beginning; who saw that this 
was only the prelude to a course of wickedness in the family of 
Ham ; who claims the right of punishing sin in whatever way he 
will; who visits the iniquities of the fathers upon the children 

81 



down to the j;enerations of them that hate him; determined to 
punish the descendants of Ham, under his providential govern- 
ment, by making them servants to their brethren. Accordingly 
he inspired Noah to pronounce the curse of servitude, not upon 
Ham personally, but upon his posterity. ♦ * * Wherever this 
curse fell, and whenever the prophecy was fulfilled, then and 
there, under the providential government of God, was the rela- 
tion between servants and masters formed. If men can forfeit 
their lives by sin, they can also forfeit their liberties, and God 
may also punish them by war, or famine, or pestilence, or fire 
from heaven, or servitude, as 'seemeth good in his sight.' This 
truth can only be denied by gross infidelity.-' 

In response to such doctrine, and this sermon, one of his 
congregation (Note. Who was he?) published the following: 

"To the Rev. Joshua L. Wilson. Senior pastor, with the session and 
membership of the First Presbyterian Church, Cincinnati. 

"Brethren : As I have lately taken my letter and withdrawn from 
your fellowship. I feel anxious to give yourselves and the public my 
reasons for a step so unusual in one of my advanced age and fixed habits. 

"I have lived in Cincinnati twenty-five years, fourteen of which 
I have been a member of the Presbyterian Church. I thought we all 
were opposed to slavery. I did not dream that the church was doing 
anything to encourage slaveholders, or to uphold their system. If there 
is a sin on earth, it is making innocent men slaves or keeping them so. 
Now with the above sentiments, I cannot continue in the First Presby- 
terian Church, for the following among other reasons, viz : 

"1st. Your communion is open to all slaveholders who are members 
of Presbyterian churches south of the Ohio. 

"2nd. My second reason for withdrawing from your communion is, 
besides fellowshiping with slaveholders, it gives slavery itself the 
strongest support, viz, a silent support. 

"3rd. A third reason for my withdrawal is, that your pastor openly 
defends slaveholding, from the sacred desk, while he pretends to regard 
the system as evil. 

"4th. The last reason I would mention for my withdrawal is, that 
I honestlv believe your church, as now conducted, tends more to support 
sin in general, than to destroy it. When a church fellowships the greatest 
and worst sins of the land, can it effectually oppose the less? And while 
you uphold slaveholding, you can make no thinking man believe you 
sincere in opposing any sin whatever. 

"The truth is, such a church has lost its hold on the consciences of 
reflecting men, and they frequent it out of habit, fashion, or some motive 
equally selfish." — A. A. T. 

FROM ROBERT MCGREW, PUBLISHERS OF THE PRESBYTERIAN 

OF THE WEST. 

Free speech may 'buy expression, if it has th^ money. 

Cincinnati, Sept. 3, 1846. 
Dear Sie: 

The first year of the Presbyterian of the West will terminate on 
the 18th inst., and the probability is that my sons, who are now the pub- 
lishers, may cease to publish it any longer under the present arrangement. 
They cannot afford to pay such a salary to the Editor, and they are 

82 



free to dispose of it as they can. Now I should like to know what could 
be done, in your opinion, with the property, by opening its columns to 
a free and full discussion of the slavery question, and keep it as an 
Old School Presbyterian paper. The subscription list is about 2400. 

Respectfully, 

Robert McGrew. 

TO HIS WIFE. 

The Assembly of ''tO. Dr. Thomas visits Dr. Bishop at '-Farmer's 
College^'. Finds him before his students, at his best. 

Philadelphia, 2d June, 1840. 

Dearest One : 

The subject of slavery came up yesterday ou the report of the com- 
mittee. I had the floor first, and spoke for perhaps an hour. I was 
enabled to follow your very kind and good advice, and to speak with 
perfect calmness and good temper. The result, as I have been informed 
from several quarters, was favorable. Southern men who at first at- 
tempted (privately )to ridicule my remarks, by degrees became attentive, 
and when I closed, admitted that what I said was reasonable and 
proper. Several Southern men congratulated me on the moderation of 
my speech, and yet I need not say to my dear wife, that I kept back 
nothing of my sentiments. I should not have said so much on this sub- 
ject, and with reference to myself were I not writing to my better half. 

The Assembly adjourned this morning. Our sessions have been very 
agreeable. Dr. Musgrave of Baltimore and Dr. McFarland of Va., al- 
though strong anti-abolitionists, parted from me in the kindest way. 
Dr. Lindsley, of Nashville, although entirely dissenting from our opinions 
in regard to slavery, politely requested Brother Fullerton and myself to 
visit the South, and enjoy his hospitality. Dr. Breckenridge of Louis- 
ville made the same request in the same manner. Dr. Hodge of Prince- 
ton shook hands with me very affectionately on parting. He is one of the 
most modest, gentle, lovely men I ever met with. He blushes like a 
young bride when anything complimentary is addressed to him. At the 
same time, he is one of the most dignified, talented and learned men of 
the Presbyterian, perhaps I might say of the American clergy. I would 
that I might possess something of his lovely, amiable. Christian 
spirit. I am free to confess that however widely I may differ from him 
in opinion in regard to slavery, my prejudices against him personally 
have wholly vanished. 

In starting for the West, I need not say I set my face in that direc- 
tion with great reluctance, leaving almost all that is dear to me east 
of the Alleghanies. I go this P. M. on the steamboat to Baltimore. A 
large party of our delegates to the Assembly, western and southern, take 
the same conveyance. Dr. Wm. Breckenridge kindly invited Brother 
Fullerton and myself to form a party with him and others, to take a 
separate stage at Cumberland, where we leave the railroad, and pass 
the mountains to Brownsville. Our party will be a very pleasant one; 
consisting of Drs. Wm. L. and Robt. J. Breckenridge; the intended step- 
daughter of the latter (he is soon to be married.— -his wife died a year 
more or less ago): Dr. J. C. Young and his eldest daughter; a friend 
from Baltimore and ourselves. If my own dear wife was in company, I 
should be perfectly happy in such society. 

On Tuesday morning at four o'clock, we set off for Pleasant 
Hill, and had a delightful ride. The air was fresh and balmy ; a 
slight rain having fallen the evening before; and the country on 
every side, offered a charming sight. Our vegetation now is in 

83 



the height of its beauty; and the lofty forests, in their summer 
dress of variously shaded green, are lovely and magnificent. I 
have never seen any forests that would compare with those of 
Ohio. I called on Dr. Bishop and attended two of his recitations. 
He lectured to one class on originality of character as a qualifi- 
cation for usefulness; illustrating his general pruhciple.s by very 
numerous examples from the biography of American statesmen ; 
and concluded with a few rules for the proper perusal of biog 
raphy, an employment in which tlie class is now engaged. The 
lecture was truly admirable; fully equal to any that 1 heard from 
him during my connection with Miami University. The class 
were young men with very good, intelligent-looking countenances; 
and they paid the strictest attention. Dr. B's health and spir- 
its are better now than they have been for several years. T be- 
lieve I told you that he is residing in the house built for him by 
the Alumni, and a very neat, convenient, pleasant one it is. 

TO HIS WIFE. 

Who fears he does not know how to live when she is aivay. 

Rossvllle. 17th Juue. IStO. 
Dearest One : 

I have just received your kind and refreshing letter, for which I have 
been anxiously waiting and inijuiring more than a week. * * Although 
late, I will at once reply ; reading your letter again and answering your 
numerous questions as they occur. 

First, however, permit me to ask that you date your letters. Your 
first letter had "May 1840" ; this, "Tuesday Eve. 1846". Now as there 
are several Tuesday Eves in 1846, I hardly know to which to assign your 
epistle. 1. I sent several copies of the Philadelphia Sun, containing the 
proceedings of both Assemblies, which I hope you received. 2. Dr. Hodge 
of Princeton, is the author of the "Way of Life". 3. Ministers in the 
Presbyterian Church are not required to become members of their own 
churches. Their connection is with the Presbytery. Ministers are under 
Shepherds; (see 1 Peter 5, 1-4). With what proi)riety then, can they be 
made sheep of their own flock? 4. I lost nothing during my whole journey 
except Hitchcock's Geology. My clothes were well done, and uninjured, 
while at Philadelphia. (By the way, si>eaking of your washerwoman, you 
should not say "a poor, but worthy woman", etc. Poverty is not incon- 
sistent with (/oodncss; on the contrary, it is as frecpiently associated with 
that quality as riches, perhaps more frequently. Pardon this correction). 

* * 7. I board at my brother's, and am very punctual : I don't 
keep them waiting. 8. I don't read books or papers at table; hav'n't done 
80 for sometime; don't intend to do so again. * * 12. Our yard has been 
mowed well and looks very pretty: the little sweet bri:ir in front of your 
chamber window has grown up above the window-seat. * * 

* * * * 

In reply to your ISth question, (surely you justify your Yankee 
origin), I may say that your letter was charged single postage, although 
doubly precious to me in size and contents. 

So far then, my good wife, I have written by way of answer to your 
interrogatories. If your letter was belter skelter, vv-hat a medley was 
mine ! * * * * 

84 



FROM REV. R. H. BISHOP, D. D. 

Cary's Academy, August 9, 1848. 

My dear friend : Were 1 to begin life again, and were I to 
be engaged in teacliing through another thirty or forty years, I 
would act, in many things, very differently from the course 
which I have often or generally followed. 

No general principle is with me more clear, than that the 
improvement of a young man's mind and the formation of his 
character for any department of life do not depend so much on 
the length of time devoted to preparatory studies or on the num- 
ber of subjects to which his attention may be directed, as on the 
clearness and accuracy of his conceptions of any one useful 
subject. 

A young man has got a good education when he has acquired 
the command of his own mind, so that he can apply it with ease 
to any of the ordinary purposes of human life. And 1 honestly 
believe that one of the great evils of all our schools, from the 
lowest to the highest, is an attempt to teach too many things in 
a given time, whether it may be one subject or another. 

I apply these facts or principles to our theological semina- 
ries; and however useful such seminaries as Princeton and Lane, 
etc., etc., may be or may have been, it is my settled conviction 
that as efficient ministers may be secured in far less time and 
at far less expense of labor. 

The outline of my plan is something like the following: 

1. To give no encouragement to any young man to study 
theology, or to take any course preparatory to the study of theol- 
ogy, till his character and talents are well known. 

2. I take a young man of established piety and who has 
gotten a good English education at any age from eighteen to 
twenty-five; and if he has made any progress in the study of 
Greek or Latin, so much the better; but not an essential pre- 
requisite, provided he gives evidence of a good, sound mind, and 
that he is sincerely and honestly devoted to the service of the 
Redeemer: and I w^ould put him under the direction of a compe- 
tent, working, efficient pastor. 

3. Under his supervision, let his first year be chiefly 
devoted to Philosophy; and let the grammars of the three lan- 
guages be his chief study, English, Latin, Greek; and let him con- 
tinue this study till he "can read with ease the Greek Testament 
and any portion of Caesar. When he has thus far advanced, 
let him begin his theological course in the regular study of the 
history and doctrines and prophecies of the Bible; and let him 
write a dissertation on some subject of Bible liistory every week. 

4. At the commencement of his second or third yeiar of 
Btudy, as the case may be, let him take some approved system 
of theology, say the Westminster Confession or Dick's Theology, 

85 



and let him study a chapter or lecture every week, and continue 
to write dissertations on subjects directly from the Bible. 

5. Let him be put under the care of Presbytery at any con 
venient stage, and let him be employed all the time of his pre- 
paratory studies in Sabbath-school or tract distribution and 
prayer- meetings, etc., etc., etc., under the direction of his pastor. 

Now for the application. 

Could you not commence a course of instruction and super 
vision, on a plan of this kind? If so, let me know it as soon as 
convenient, and I will furnish you with some two or three men 
to begin with. Sincerelv vours, 

R. H. Bishop. 

P. S. My notion is, some two to five pious and active young 
men under your direction would be a tolerable addition to the 
moral and religious influence of Hamilton, which has hitherto 
been for young men a nursery for . (Note. Illegi- 
ble on the manuscript, but not difficult to be supplied by any res- 
ident of Hamilton). I think also that your parochial school and 
Farmer's College might aid and react on each other. Let a 
young man of the right stamp be one year or eighteen months 
here, and then two or three years with you ; then eighteen months 
here and again one year or eighteen months with you, etc. 

Note, Dr. Bishop was a great teacher because he had been 

well taught; because he had a genius for the business, and 

because of the training of a long experience. Sometime, when 

Miami justifies herself, she will frescoe her vestibule with part 

of the first three paragraphs of this letter. Or she might frame 

and hang these sentences in her School of Pedagogy. We can 

wait until she does: meanwhile, the printer may set the copy 

here. 

"Gary's Academy, August 9, 1848. 

"Were I to begin my life again, and were I to be engaged in teaching 
through another thirty or forty years. I would act, in many things, very 
differently from the course which I have often or generally followed. 

No general principle is with me more clear, than that the improvement 
of a young man's mind and the formation of his character for any depart- 
ment of life do not depend so much on the number of subjects to which 
his attention may be directed, as on the clearness and the accuracy of his 
conceptions of any one useful subject. 

A young man has got a good education when he has acquired the 
command of his own mind, so that he can apply it with ease to any of 
the ordinary purposes of human life. And I honestly believe that one of 
the great evils of all our schools, from the lowest to the highest, is an 
attempt to teach too many things in a given time, whether it may be one 
subject or another." 

The misnomer of "Farmer's College" was due to the Carys, 
not to Dr. Bishop: to him from the time he went there, it was 
Gary's Academy. 

The teaching of old Dr. Adam in the high school of Edin- 
burg was narrow, but the finest in the world to give a student 

86 



trained capacity to learn other things. The mistake is in sup- 
posing that at first, by widening a student's studies you 
strengthen his mind and widen his interest. The reverse is true, 
— so at least Dr. Bishop thought, after forty years of teaching. 
If Dr. Bishop's words have value, it is because they are wise ; and 
practical and needed and of permanent and general application, 
in all schools and to every student, in his ''preparatory studies" 
and in his later technical training. 

You laugh at the narrowness of Bishop's ideal of what a 
student's ought to be. My father, his pupil, did not so under 
stand. While teaching in Franklin and quickly fitting for the 
ministry, he lectured there on chemistry with demonstrations, 
in church, to large and entertained audiences, who were not 
special students. Five years later. Prof. Jno. W. Scott and 
he rode often in Southwestern Ohio, botanizing, and my father 
taught botany for years. Later yet, Jared M. Stone and he 
made a collection of rocks and fossils in Southern Indiana 
that attracted curiosity and gratitude of Prof. Henry of the 
Smithsonian Institution. Throughout the war, he by voice and 
pen, led and held this whole Dayton community to the support 
of the war, which to him was a crusade. 

Nothing was further from the wishes of these early 
teachers of Miami than to have education go on in the groove it 
had come to them in. Dr. Bishop listened, and warmly approved 
what Dr. MacMaster said when resigning the presidency at 
Oxford, on the essentials of professional education. There was 
nothing narrow about that, and it is the best written or spoken 
word in the literature of Pedagogics. 

The wants of an unheard of and urgent industrial develop- 
ment require our sons to study, not "Dick's Theology," but 
Dynamometry and gas engines, do they? Then let them. Admis- 
sion to a mechanical engineering course at Cornell now requires 
a breadth and degree of preparation measured on one item, by 
advanced French and advanced German. Its president called 
such students together this year, and regretfully announced that 
experience began to convince Cornell's instructors that its vari- 
ety of studies and high attainment do not consist; and that to 
reach such high attainment they must abandon so many avenues 
of approach. 

If report comes to me correctly, he would now highly 
approve the first three paragraphs of the above letter. If those 
words were on your vestibule, and he should visit Miami, he 
would more likely copy them in his note book; then go home and 
tell his students what they were, than try to remember the wide 
variety of electives you offer to unmatured minds, — a mistake 
his university is making already. If those words of Dr. Bishop 
have wisdom, they are modestly said, and apply to any student 

87 



in the obscurity of any remote home in touch with any "Corre- 
spondence School.'' 

Kindly think if these thinjj^s be not so, and if they be so, let 
us forget the threadbare coat Dr. Bishop wore, and the price of 
cornmeal and barley corns which Miami University fed him. 

The second half of Dr. Bishop's letter, for it divides itself 
in two parts, is not less striking. The writer of the Centennial 
memorial, cha])ter 1, derides President Garfield's favorite and 
famed definition of a liberal education, — "]Mark Hopkins on one 
end of a log and student on tlie other." 

President Eliot of Harvard, from the vantage gi'ound of 
much experience to qualify him to know, seems to be in favor of 
Garfield's view. In an address he said : 

"To the making of a gentleman what is necessary? In the first 
place natural gifts. * * In other words he is a person of fine bodily and 
spiritual qualities, mostly innate. Secondly, he must have thorough ele- 
mentary education, early access to hooks, and therefore to great thoughts 
and high examples. Thirdly, he nuist be early brought into contact with 
some i-efined and noble person — father, mother, teacher, pastor, employer, 
or friend." 

In trying to express the same thing, l>r. Bishop in his post- 
script, uses the better words "a young man of the right stamp.'' 
He would have taken his pen and erased from Eliot's line the 
word "bodily." "But E, was speaking of the making of a gentle- 
man." Yes, but it does not take bodily qualities to do that. 
Lincoln proved this. In a beautiful biographical tribute to his 
dead son. President Eliot writes: ''He believed that a loving 
God rules the universe, that the path to loving Him lies through 
loving and serving men, and that the way to worship Him is to 
reverence the earthlv beauty, truth, and goodness He has brought 
forth." * 

Dr. Bishop would have taken his pen and erased the word 
"earthly." 

Perhaps the latter half of Dr. Bisho})'s letter was, for a the- 
ological student not so bad an offer. Only a log, — on the one 
end the old doctor feeling he had *'the arm of the Almighty 
about him ;" on the other Dr. Thomas, who would teach him Latin, 
Greek, Hebrew and Exegesis. Kindly note the doctor offers no 
Y. M. C. A. "technical training in ninety days," with a diploma 
at the end. Read again in the postscript of this letter, the "first 
year," and "the second and third year" of study, he is to write 
and at last to preach, while he is learning and when he has 
learned what to say. Please note again, that about them then 
ivcrc many young men hungry for these technics, who looked up 
and were not fed; they had no money, and what Dr. Bishop 
proposed, would cost them nothing. A. A. T., May, 1909. 

* "Chas. Eliot. Landscape Architect,'' page 748. 

88 



TO REV. CHARLES STURDEVANT, D. D. 
Would he ^'disturb the community''' f 

Rossville, 25th June, 1849. 
My dear Brother Sturdevant : 

You have no reason to fear wearying me with your epistles. 
I know the kind intentions which dictate your letter; although I 
must wholly disagree with your conclusions. 

''Could I ask a slaveholder to preach for me"? There are 
some men more or less connected with slavei"}' whom I should 
feel it a privilege to hear; but I fear there are not a few who 
might show clean papers, technichally so called, whom I could 
neither ask to preach, nor sit to hear. I should be obliged to 
judge every case on its merits. If I met with a minister excusa- 
bly involved, I should seek any ministerial or other association 
with him. t^econdly. "Would you feel it your duty to discuss 
this great and perplexing subject, either in public or in private, 
to the disturbance of the community?" You scarcely mean to 
ask whether I would discuss the question or preach on it, for 
the purpose of disturbing a community; and if you mean to en- 
quire whether I should discuss it as duty might seem to demand, 
without regard to all the clamor on earth or in hell, I answer, 
YES. I thank God no subject is so great or perplexing that I 
should hesitate to discuss it publicly or privately, whenever in 
the providence of God the circumstances around me might re- 
quire it, without forethought or afterthought, as to the effect the 
truth might have in disturbing anybody. I do not mean to say 
tliat I should, under any circumstances feel myself obliged to 
preach about slavery merely to show my independence ; that were 
folly ; but it is my deliberate conviction that the man is un- 
worthy of the pulpit who would, in any way, or to any extent, 
enter into a compromise with public sentiment in reference to 
this subject, or tone down his preaching as an ambassador of 
God. Pardon me, if I need pardon, for the faithful statement of 
my consciencious belief on this subject, which, in my judgment 
is a vital one. 

DR. ROBERT H. BISHOR TO PROFESSOR .TARED 'SI. STONE. 

SSees in retrospect and. for the first time, ''the difficulties with 
which he was surrounded the last fire years at Oxford". 
But feels "the arm of the Almighty has been about him". 
"Disappointments often the greatest blessings". 

My dear friend : 26 June, 1849. 

What I did, or said, or proposed, as to a new organization of 
Miami University, was all on the spur of the moment; and, as I 

89 



know my own heart, T had no personal or private ends to gratify. 
I was, however, in that, as on some other occasions, but suffering 
by being too full and forward in uttering at once all my thoughts. 
If I know myself, no man can feel more deeply for the |)ermanent 
prosperity of Miami University than I do ; but I have not wished 
to force my views or plans. 

One word more. I regret that I was not informed that Dr. 
Anderson's name was to be introduced, previous to the meeting of 
the Board. I should not in that case have written all that I 
have written ; yet I hold to my general principle, that the hope of 
Miami University must be in her sons. 

I never since I left Kentucky, saw and felt the evils of slan- 
der as I now see and feel them ; and I had no adequate concep- 
tion of the difficulties with which I was surrounded during my 
last five years residence in Oxford, till I had been one year in a 
new situation. My life has been full of mistakes and blunders; 
still I have some considerable evidence that the arm of the Al- 
migthy has been about me ; and that some of my disappointments 
have been among my greatest mercies. I ought now to be done 
with all the plans, in contriving and balancing of different inter 
ests and human arrangements, to be ready to depart at any hour's 
warning for another world. Sincerely yours, 

R. H. Bishop. 



90 



IV 

TO REV. W. SICKBLS, A TRUSTEE OF HANOVER COLLEGE. 

The education of Islorthern ministers in a slave state. WJmt 
icill follow, if the young men go to Danville. 

My Dear Brother Sickels: Hanover College, 21 July, 1854. 

I came to the conclusion that I should exchange Hanover 
College for New Albany Theological Seminary, very slowly, and 
I may say reluctantly. We greatly need a seminary in the free 
states of the West : our men are seriously dissatisfied with Prince 
ton; — many of them are not there,— will not go there. I cannot 
persuade myself that the Head of the Church would approve our 
sending them to the slave state, for that training. I believe that 
a greater blow could scarcely be inflicted upon our northern 
church. Let southern students, born and reared among the in- 
fluences of slavery, receive their education at Danville. They 
may come out with a cordial abhorrence of slavery. But take 
Northern men there to overcome their ^'prejudices" by familiarity 
with the peculiar institution — in other words, blunt their sensi- 
bilities, sear their conscience, erase all recollections of the love 
of freedom which a mother's early lessons had taught; and you 
prepare them, and send them over our free regions to be the very 
stoutest advocates of American slavery. I say again, may God 
spare our churches from such a ministry. I have no idea of 
making New Albany Seminary an "abolition concern", in the 
sense which many good men would attach to that phrase; yet T 
would prefer an abolition to a pro-slavery concern, if we must 
have either. But if our churches in the North West not only do 
not build up an institution where their sons may be trained at 
home; but actually throw away |50,000 already secured for it, 
and abandon what our fathers have labored on during a quarter 
of a century; they do actually recommend their candidates for 
the ministry to seek an education at Danville. And T have as 
surance that many were prepared to put such an interpretation 
upon our action. 

FROM REV. W. C. ANDERSON, D. D. 

Who as President of Miami Succeeded Dr. MacMaster. 

Rev. Dr. Thomas. San Francisco, 5 August, 1856. 

Dear Brother: .John leaves us this morning to spend another year 
with you. If he can be licensed at the close of your next session, and 

91 



with the necessary preparations, I will be pleased. We need help sadly 
in these wide desolations ; and the mining towns and camps present an 
interesting field for a young man to practice on ; but he must be able to 
preach to some purpose, or it is vain to do anything among them. Such 
communities. Brother Thomas, you never saw, and never will see unless 
you come to California. Think of a congregation t»f four hundred to seven 
hundred rough looking customers, with long beards and mustaches, 
slouched hats and red shirts : not a dozen females among the lot ; and i>er- 
haps one-half of the entire number are graduated at some of our best 
American Colleges; the other half shrewd, keen, knowing ones: all 
critics ; all, as they supiwse, .iudges, and in fact judges. The uian who 
enters such a congregation and supposes that he is addressing a collection 
of Welsh and English miners, or of ordinary laboring men. is just as far 
up the wrong tree as he can climb without endangering his neck. 

I hope that you will be able to make a first class preacher out of my 
son. If you do not. please keep him at home, and get him a church in 
Ohio or Indiana. We have enough of common men here ah-eady. in the 
ministry, and when I came I think that there was one more than enough. 

TO NATHANIEL FISHER, HIS FATHEK-IN-LAW. 

Dr. Thomas's icork ; finances; the completed result of twenty 
years labor in the ministry. Review of the question of Semi- 
nary, and its removal. ]\am€s of men co-operatiny. 

New Albanv Theolog. Seminary. 

Nov. 14. 18.56. 
My dear Sir: 

As relates to my own employment, I am still engaged in the Semi- 
nary; in addition to which, since last April, I have been preaching on 
the Sabbath to the church at Jeffersonville, about six miles east of us on 
the Ohio. I have usually, through the summer, walked up early on 
Sabbath morning ; preached at 10 : .30 A. M. : held a Bible Class at 3 : .SO 
P. M. ; preached again at night ; and walked home after service Sabbath 
night, or before breakfast on ^londay. This, together with three hours 
of daily teaching in the seminary, and the necessai-y private study, gives 
me full employment : and may justify the inference that I am blessed 
with health and strength. The opiwrtunity to preach was a providential 
opening unsought, and indeed unexpected; but it came as all blessings do 
come, very opportunely. My salary here is twelve hundred dollars, and 
is paid slowly but really. This would seem to be enough : but as I did 
not receive from Hanover College all that was due nie when I left. I 
had some debts which I have since paid out of money received here. 
And then, for the past two or three years, provisions of all sorts, (and 
indeed all things) have been so high-priced that $1200 have not been 
worth more than $GW) I received at Hamilton, with former prices of 
marketing. Besides this, our family now growing up, and requiring edu- 
cation, (May is taller than her mother) calls for an increased exi)endi- 
ture. It was a kind providence, therefore, which opened the way for 
usefulness at Jeffersonville, not at all interfering with my seminary 
duties, but adding $.500 per year, paid every week, to our income. We 
hope and expect, when we leave New Albany, as we probably shall leave 
next spring, to be out of debt, here and everywhere. And this freedom 
from indebtedness which I have never enjoyed before since I left college, 
will be the pecuniary result of twenty years hard labor in the ministry. 
I completed my twenty years as a minister about the middle of October 
last. To owe 'nothing and own nothing will be all that I can boast in 
this line. Surely the ministry, in these days, does not present many 

92 



worldly attractions I Blessed be God that there are other rewards than 
those which can l)e estimated in dollars and cents ! I have spoken of our 
leaving New Albany next Spring. I suppose you have heard something 
of our recent plans for the removal of the seminary; or rather for the 
establishment of a new one, in which this is to be merged. 

To explain this movement, I must inform you that the New 
Albany Seminary was established here in 1840, with a view to 
unite in its support the churches in Kentucky, Tennessee and 
Missouri, as well as those of Ohio, Indiana and Illinois. In fact, 
however, no earnest or effective co-operation was ever secured, 
and the seminary remained but partially endowed and manned. 
In 1853, the General Assembly was invited to take charge of and 
perfect our seminary ; but, through the influence of one or two 
men from Kentucky, and the predominance of Southern power 
and sympathy, the Assembly virtually declined the offer of this 
seminary, and established another at Danville, Ky, The Synods 
in the free states were displeased with this action : the three 
Synods of Cincinnati, Indiana, and Northern Indiana determined 
to maintain the seminary here. I was then at Hanover, but was 
a director of the seminary, and felt a deep interest in the educa- 
tion of our future ministry in a free state, away, from the pol- 
luting influences of slavery. 

It was foreseen, however, that when Kentucky, Tennessee and Mis- 
souri had withdrawn. New Albany was no longer a suitable place for 
our seminary ; being wholly on one side of the territory which it was 
designed to supply. Still, we felt satisfied that we had better wait a 
while before we attempted a removal. In the meantime, we could do 
nothing toward an increase of endowment ; could not, therefore, increase 
the number of professors : and so could not compete fairly with the older and 
better furnished institutions. We could exi)ect but few students, and must 
await jiatiently doing what we could, until the time had come for action. 
This summei". after mature consideration of the subject, we were satisfied 
that the time had come. Accordingly I drew up an appeal to the seven 
Synods of the northwestern free States, which was signed by a number 
of our friends, * and sent in a printed pami)hlet to all our churches 
and ministers in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois. Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa. 
Dr. MacMaster, Dr. Stevenson, (the pastor of the church here) and 
I attended the meetings of the Synods this fall. Dr. S. and I first 
visited the Synod of Cincinnati. Oct. 2nd, at Urbana, Ohio. That 
body with the exception of one man, adopted a constitution of a new 
seminary, which bad been already prepared at New Albany ; and 
appointed directors to meet at Chicago, and take the necessary measures 
for establishing the institution, and incorporating into it this seminary. 
From Urbana, Dr. S. and I went to Chicago, where we spent a day and 
separated : he to visit the Iowa Synod, at Burlington ; I to meet that 
of Wisconsin, at Janesville ; while Dr. MacMaster met that of Illinois, 
at Springfield. The three Synods met on the same day. and unanimously 
adopted our constitution. 

Next week. I went to Crawfordsville, Ind.. where the Synod of 
Northern Indiana met ; while Dr. S. met the Synod of Chicago at Prince- 

* This apjieal \\'as signed by E. D. Mac^Iaster, .J. M. Stevenson, J. W. 
Scott, J. G. Monfort, H. Maltliy, Jno. F. Crowe, Thos. S. Crowe, T. E. 
Thomas, John Crozier, Victor King. Cyrus Falconer, Nehemiah Wade, O. N. 
Stoddard, Ch. Elliott, J. H. McCampbell. P. S. Shields and .Tno. Bushness. 

93 



ton. 111. The Synods of Chicago and Northern Indiana tooli early and 
unanimous action in favor of the new Seminary ; so that Dr. S. and I 
reached Paris. 111., he from the West and I from the East, within half 
an hour of each other on Saturday evening : and had the satisfaction of 
aiding in the adoption of our constitution the same evening ; thus com- 
pleting the work. Each of the Synods elected Directors. The Board of 
Directors assembled this day week in Chicago. (Note. They were: 
Synod of Cincinnati. Rev. R. L. Stanton, Rev. J. G. Montfort. Rev. N. West, 
Jr., Rev. W. B. Spence, Prof. O. N. Stoddard. J. M. Glover, Esq.. E. A. 
Moore. Esq. — Synod of Indiana. Rev. Jno. M. Stevenson, Rev. Jno. A. 
Steele, Rev. Alex. Street, A. R. Forsythe, Esq.. James Blake, Esq., James 
M. Ray, Esq. — Synod of Northern Indiana, Rev. J. C. Brown, Rev. Levi 
Hughs. Victor King. Esq., Jesse L. Williams. Esq.. — Synod of Illinois. Rev. 
T. W. Haynes, Rev. F. N. Ewing. James L. Lamb, Esq. — Synod of Chicago, 
Rev. S. T. Wilson, Rev. R. C. Matthews, C. A. Spring. Esq. — Synod of 
Iowa. Rev. Joshua Phelps. Rev. Jas. D. Mason, Rev. J. J. Baird, Hon. 
Lincoln Clark, Jno. P. Conkey. Esq. — Synod of Wisconsin, Rev. J. M. 
Buchanan, Rev. H. M. Robertson. Warren Norton, Esq.) I was not present ; 
but Dr. Stevenson, who was a member of the Board, and Dr. MacMaster, 
have just returned. 

They agreed to establish the new seminary called "The Theological 
Seminai'y of the North West", about seven miles southeast of Chicago, on 
the shore of Lake Michigan, and on the Michigan Central Railway. The 
site is a beautiful elevation, covered with forest trees. The railroad 
makes it but a few moments distant from the city. Here, the Board 
proposes to erect a suitable seminary building, and houses for three 
professors ; and it is hoped that they may be ready by next Fall, so that 
the institution may be opened in October. Dr. MacMaster and I were 
elected professors in the departments we now occupy ; and the Rev. Dr. 
John Brown. President of Jefferson College, Penn., was appointed to the 
professorship of Church History. 

I have not yet decided whether to accept the professorship offered 
me : and if I should, I shall not remove there until our support is secured 
by the endowment. 

Note. The names of the Directors of the New Albany Theo- 
logical Seminary, successively, were the following : 

S. Ramsey Wilson, J. N. Candee. Joseph G. Monfort. William S. Potts, 
Samuel Steele, Tho. V. Thornton, W. C. Matthews. H. H. Cambern. Wil- 
liamson Dunn, Jno. Bushnell, Sylvester Scovel. Victor King, J. Finley 
Crowe. N. L. Rice, Tho. E. Thomas, Frances Monfort, Daniel Stewart, 
Chauncey Leavenworth, T. E. Hughes. James Coe. W. C. Anderson. Sam'l 
Cleland, S. Newell, Elias Ayers, Wm. Plummer. R. G. Wilson, E. D. Mac- 
Master, Jas. C. Barnes, J. Edwards. Wm. W. Hill. Edw. P. Humphrey, 
Jno. S. Galloway. D. L. Gray, Henry L. Brown. J. S. Shields, Jno. D. 
Therpel, W. Richardson, J. S. Bereyman, Jno. Clark Bayliss, R. C. Grundy, 
A. R. Forsythe, Jos. C. Clappe, Phillip Lindsley, James Wood. Thos. A. 
Biggs, Sr., Alex. Sterrit, M. Sturgus, W. L. Breckenridge. David Osborn, 
F. N. Ewing, Edw. H. Hopkins, Tho. V. Thornton, Sam'l Casseway, J. M. 
Preston, Owen Glass, A. B. Andrew, Chas. Sturdevant, L. J. Halsey, Sam'l 
McCampbell, J. M. Stevenson, J. D. Paxton. E. K. Lynn, Jno. F. Smith, 
Dan'l Lattimore, Hugh S. Fulerton. M. Maltby. Thos. ^Vhallen. J. A. 
Steele, Jno. Hendricks, W. Y. Allen. Jesse L. Williams, Jno. M. Worrell, 
Alex. McPheeters, E. W. Wright, Levi Hughs, J. S. Weaver, Wm. A. 
Ustick, James Blake, A. B. McKee. W. B. Spence, D. D. McKee, Jno. Milli- 
gan, Cyrus Falconer, Sam'l S. Potter, Wm. Bishop, J. H. McCampbell. 



94 



TO PRaFESSOR JARED M. STONE. 

Cannot remain professor in Seminary, unless he will he silent 
on Slavery question. "Td rather he a dog and hay the 
moon' than a professor in such a Seminary". 

New Albany, Ind., 10 Aug. 1857. 
My dear Brother Stone: 

Your favor of July 30th r-eached me the day I went to Han- 
over. I am glad to hear of your health. May your shadow and 
that of your University never grow less! For myself, I am sup- 
plying Dr. Stevenson's place here, until the Synods meet this 
Fall ; after that I know not yet where I shall be ; perhaps I may 
remain here longer, perhaps not. 

As for our seminary at Chicago, I fear from late information, 
that all is lost. Brother Spring, etc., have gone over horse, foot 
and dragoons to Dr. Rice. He has been called to the North 
Church in Chicago; will probably go; and his design is to place 
the seminary under the Assembly ; or eject us, and place safe men 
at its head. Of course he is the safest man in the northwest. 
Should a majority of the Synods sustain this movement, the semi- 
nary will be as safe as that of Columbia, S. C. Perhaps there 
may be a new controversy and then a division ; and all will be 
dead as a door nail. 

The ground taken, as I understand it, by the leading influ- 
ences at Chicago is, that the seminary, and its professors are to 
be entirely silent on the slavery question ; to believe nothing, do 
nothing. You know me well enough to need no assurance that 
"I'd rather be a dog and bay the moon than" a professor in such 
a seminary. The plan is to put the seminary under the General 
Assembly, vacating the chairs, of course; and then no danger of 
MacMaster's election or mine. I would, for the sake of the 
seminary, and for the regard I have had and still strive to enter- 
tain for our good brethren at Chicago, that all this were false; 
but I have evidence that will not permit me to doubt its truth. 
McCormick, the Reaper man, and a warm friend of Senator 
Douglas, has offered |2,000 a year toward Dr. Rice's salary, if 
the church will give |3,000 more. I learn to-day that Dr. Rice 
preached in Chicago yesterday, and will probably accept the call 
which has been given. 

It is painful to think that such is to be the end of all our 
efforts. But God reigns, and will bring order out of confusion. 
For my own part, I have never accepted the professorship ten- 
dered me ; and did not intend to do so. until I should see whether 
the Synods would sustain the acts of the Board of Directors. 
While I am not, and never was disposed to divide the church on 
the slavery question, or anything else; or to ride it as a hobby, 
forgetful of the many other questions which invite attention, I 

95 



can never consent to be dumb at the bidding of any Board, clique, 
or party in church or state. 

You ask me what I think of Fullerton's suggestion. Certain 
ly I feel deeply grieved in view of the present lamentable declen- 
sion of our church regarding slavery ; and should our own north 
western Synods virtually declare that hostility to slavery, how 
ever expressed, is enough to place a man under the ban of the 
church, I shall feel still more deeply the humiliation of our con- 
dition; seeing that in the lowest deep, a lower still opens to de 
vour us. And yet I am not prepared to abandon the church of 
my fathers. Rather let all who would rescue her from the thral 
dom of the Slave Power unite in such measures as may, with the 
divine blessing, awaken again the dying spark of her former love 
of liberty. What these measures may be, remains to be consid 
ered when an opportunity for action shall present itself. 

I cannot say certainly that I shall visit Iowa this fall. 
Should developments at Chicago render it necessary, I may do 
so; and will advise you in time. 

FROM REV. JOHN A. STEELE. 

Dr. Rice secures the chair of Dr. MacMaster. 

Grand View, 111., Sept. 18, 1857. 
Dear Brother: 

Since returning from Chicago, I have learned some things 
that I ought perhaps to advise you of. I am not allowed to use 
the name of my informant. I saw Dr. N. L. Rice's dispatch from 
St. Louis. It contained the words, "Secure if possible the chair 
of Theology.'' * 

I think you will find that what you did by way of compro- 
mise will embolden him to ask more. Yours truly, 

Jno. a. Steele. 

Rev. Dr. Nathan L. Rice. Sketch of his life and anti-slavery 
and other activities. His puhlications and priruciples. 

Note 1. This was the chair occupied by Dr. MacMaster. 

Note 2. Dr. Rico claimed this dispatch was worded thus wholly : "you 
had l)etter insist on tlie chair of Theology ;" and he save this in explanation 
and extenuation of the message, — "if my election was designed to give con- 
fidence to those who were dissatisfied, it was obviously essential that I 
should occupy one of the chairs in which the sul>ject of slavery, if at all 
discussed, would properly come up". (Pamphlet entitled "North Western 
Theological Seminary", published and signed by Nathan L. Rice.) 

Note 3. Rev. Nathan Lewis Rice, D. D., the son of Gabriel and Phebe 
(Garrald) Rice, was born in Garard Co. Kentucky, in 1807; entered Cen- 
ter College, Danville, Ky., in 1826 ; l^egan. while there, the study of theol- 
ogy under Dr. Gideon Blackburn, then President of that Institution, and 
was licensed to preach at the age of twenty. He, with his brother, also 

96 



a minister of bright promise, wlio died at an untimely age, grew up large- 
ly under the tutelage and influence of Rev. James C. Barnes. Dr. Rice 
passed his next two years at Princeton Seminary, and took his first pas- 
toral charge in 1832, at Bardstown, Ky. Here he founded a Female Semi- 
nary, and edited the "Western Herald," afterwards the "Protestant Her- 
ald",which became merged into the "Presbyterian Herald" at Louisville. 
In 1840, he became pastor at Paris, Ky., and while so engaged, during 
the next four years, had a debate with Dr. Fanning of Nashville, Tenn., 
and a discussion at Lexington, Ky., with Alexander Campbell, on baptism. 
In May 1844, he became pastor of the Central Church in Cincinnati : 
while there he edited the Presbyterian of the West, since become the 
Herald and Presbyter ; also held debates with the late Archbishop Pur- 
cell, (not then Archbishop), on Catholicism; and with Kev. J. Blanchard, 
then pastor of the Sixth Presbyterian Church in Cincinnati, on Slavery. 
These discussions were listened to by large audiences, and were published 
and widely read : the debate on Universalism continued eight evenings ; 
that with Dr. Alexander Campbell, held at Lexington, for eighteen days. 
In the debate with Dr. Blanchard, in Oct. 1845, Dr. Rice maintained the 
biblical sanction of the system of American Slavery. Dr. Rice, June 23, 
1847, became, at the same time with Dr. Thomas, a member of the Board 
of Directors of the New Albany Theological Seminary. In 1853, he re- 
moved to St. Louis, Mo., to become pastor of the Second Presbyterian 
Church, and while there edited the "St. Louis Presbyterian." and pub- 
lished his works on "Baptism," "The Signs of the Times," "Immortality 
of the Soul," and "Ten Letters on Slavery :" and he was made Moderator 
of the General Assembly, which met at Nashville, in 185.5. In 1857, he was 
called to the North Church in Chicago, and while here founded and edited 
"The Expositor." since merged into the "Interior." and was instrumental 
in locating the McCormick Theological Seminary, to which he was elected 
professor of Theology by the General Assembly, then in session at Indian- 
apolis in 1859. In 1861, he went to the Fifth Avenue Church. N. Y. City, 
(now Dr. John Hall's). In 18G7, he resigned this pastorate, but after 
two years recuperation, became President of Westminster College, Fulton, 
Mo. In 1874, he was elected Professor of Theology in Danville Sem., 
and while holding this position died. June 11, 1877. 

The foregoing is the meagi'e outline of a wonderfully active and in- 
dustrious life. I'erhaps it is proper and best here to say nothing more 
about Dr. Nathan L. Rice, further than to define and express his attitude 
as a biblical defender of the institution of slavei"y, by some quotations of 
what he saw fit to write and print in the controversy that so greatly- 
agitated the church. He was a voluminous writer and manent libri 
script i. 

"If I buy a man, he is mine so far as his services are concerned". 
(Debate on Slavery held in Cincinnati with Rev. J. Blanchard. in Octo- 
ber 1845, p. 106). 

"I have proved that God did give the Jews express permission to 
buy and hold slaves. I am under no obligation to assign the reason why 
God gave the Jews permission to buy and hold slaves. I have proved 
the fact ; and that is sufficient to prove the doctrine of the abolitionists 
false. Yet I will give what was, as I suppose, the reason. Doubtless he 
intended that in this way degraded heathen should be inade acquainted 
with the blessed religion by which they might be made happier on earth 
and might secure eternal life". (Debate on Slavery). 

"Many odious charges, as you know, were brought against the Apos- 
tles of Christ : and yet, though slavery existed in its most odious form 
throughout all parts of the Roman Empire, they never were charged with 
being abolitionists". (Debate on Slavery). 

"In the first place, no Christian will deny that it is infinitely more 
Important that the slaves be delivered from the bondage of sin and Satan 
than from temporal slavery. 

97 



"The actual tendency of abolitionism is to perpetuate, not to abolish 
slavery, and to aggravate all its evils ; and especially to take away a 
preached Gospel from master and slave". (Debate with Blanchard, p. 
199). 

"The last warm debate on slavery in the Cincinnati Synod was on a 
paper introduced by Dr. MacMaster. one design of which was to condemn 
the action of the Assembly of 1845. We can't approve his appointment 
(as a Professor in New Albany Seminary), while he holds these views. 
We deem it. therefore, of the first importance that our Professors of Theol- 
ogy take the sa-iptural vieic of slavery". (Editorial in Pres. of the West, 
Cinti.. Nov. 1, 1849). 

"The golden rule — "Whatsoever ye would that men should do to 
you, do ye even so to them" — does not forbid slaveholding under all cir- 
cumstances. On the contrary, there are not a few instances in which it 
makes men slaveholders ; because by becoming such, they can greatly 
improve the condition of a suffering fellow creature". (Debate with 
Blanchard. p. 259). 

The sentiment last above quoted is worthy of Geo. White- 
field who, early in Colonial days, went to England to get a permit 
to introduce slaves on the then free soil of Georgia. 

'^I should think nvyself highly favored/' said he, 'Hf I could 
purchase a good nurriher of them, in order to make their lives 
comfortable, and lay a foundation for breeding up their posterity 
in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." {Matlack's Anti- 
Slavery Struggle, p. 30.)— A. A. T. 

TO PROFESSOR JARED M. STONE. 

Dr. Thomas goes out of his professorship, and gives the reasons. 
Reviews slavery's demand on the church in the North. 

New Albany, Ind., 2.3rd Sept. 1857. 
My Dear Brother Stone : 

It would give me great pleasure to meet you at Dubuque; but I 
cannot go there. In fact, I have resolved not to attend any Synodical 
meeting this Fall. I have always felt that there was an appearance of 
self-seeking, most opposite to my habits and character, in the course of 
events last Fall. Two or three of us originated the project of a new 
Seminary. We published a Circular — prepared a Constitution — presented 
it personally before seven Synods. A Board of Directors met at Chicago, 
in accordance with that Constitution, and their tirst act was to elect Dr. 
MacMaster and me as Professors. Now God knows, and the Board of 
Directors know, that we had nothing to do with that election ; that we 
used no means, direct or indirect, toward such a result. I need not as- 
sure you of this ; but there are many, who do not know us. nor the facts 
in the case, to whom these things would wear, at least the appearance, 
of management to secure personal promotion. Now that opposition has 
been made to our election ; and a course of measures has been adopted, 
the obvious, and in some cases avowed, design of which is to eject us 
from the Seminary : I cannot persuade myself that it is becoming for us 
to traverse the north west, attending Synods to which we do not belong, 
for the purpose of vindicating the act of the Board by which we were 
elected. I know very well that the opposition made to us is grounded 
on our anti-slavery principles ; so that a defence of ourselves would be 
really a battle fought for those principles : or rather, for freedom of 
thought, and of speech, in the Presbj^terian Church, in these Free states. 
Strange, passing strange, that such a statement should be true ; and yet 

98 



it is true to the letter. Men are attempting to place under the ban of 
the church all Avho dare whisper a syllable against that accursed system 
of slavery under which our whole country groans. To use late language 
of the Philadelphia Presbvterian, such men are already "spotted". Still, 
this does not alter the case. The Synods know these facts; our whole 
church know it; and if there remain among us a single spark of our 
ancient character, the Northwest will indignantly spurn the bit — the gag. 
They should not need — they should not allow— any defence from us, 
against such charges. If they will not, of themselves, repel the pro- 
slavery spirit— it is not worth while to defend ourselves. If they will, 
it is not necessary. No! I shall studiously absent myself from every 
Synod- even froni our own. If they think the Board did wrong in 
appointing me, let them say so. I shall not be distressed about it. If 
they confirm that appointment, my duty will be plain. 

But you ought to attend your Synod; and I hope that no considera- 
tion will prevent you. The question is to be decided whether the whole 
future ministry of^ the north west, in our denomination, is to be leavened 
with a pro-slavery spirit, or not :— whether hostility to slavery is, or it 
not, to be forbidden among Presbyterians of the Free states: whether 
submission and subscription to slave-holding supremacy, in church and 
state, shall be a sine qua non in the region covered by the ordinance of 
1787 

Your Synod is to vote upon that question, at Dubuque, during the 
first week in October. Dr. Rice will be there to assist in the decision. 
And the further question is. Will Brother Stone, an anti-slavery man of 
thirty years standing— a Professor in the State University of Republican 
Iowa— a full-blooded Yankee— and what is more, a man^homo— (how- 
square and solid and compact and independent a look that word Homo 
has; as if it could stand by itself, and feared nobody); will Jared M. 
Stone he at Thermopylae, to make his mark upon the Persians? I shall 
look for an answer from Dubuque. 

TO REV. JOS. G. MONFORT, D. D.. EDITOR OF THE PRESBYTERIAN 

OP THE WEST. 

Dr. TJwmus agrees icith Dr. MacMaster, but tcill not contest the 
issue. Finds no call to speak further. Declines Dr. Jos. G. 
Monforfs inquest that he piihlish something. His clear and 
brief retnew of the slavery contest in the Presbyterian 
Church. His finest letter on the subject. "I sucked in 
enmity to sUvery with my mother's milk. I loas taught to 
Jmte it on my father's knee". 

Confidential. Pardon the seeming egotism of this hasty letter: you 
asked me for an expre.ssion of my own views and sentiments. But I write 
for you, not for the public. 

New Albany, 28 Sept.. 185 <. 

My dear Brother Monfort : 

I know you will be disappointed ; but I trust you will not be offended, 
because I send vou no communication for the Synod about slavery. I 
must, however, be guided by my own judgment of propriety in the case; 
and. after all the thought which I can bestow on the subject, I am not 
convinced either that I have any adequate occasion for writing such an 
expose of my views ; or that, if written, it could accomplish any valuable 
result; while it is certain that, under present circumstances, it would be 
liable to serious misconstruction. I agree, substantially, with the views 
presented to the Board at Chicago, by Dr. MacMaster, Had I been per- 

99 



luitted to attend, I should have offered a siiuilar paper. But the fact has 
been publicly announced in the newspapers that I concur with him. To 
repeat the same statements over my own name would be unnecessary. 
Should my representation of principles be thought to vary materially from 
his, we should appear in an unpleasant attitude toward each other. Were 
I to offer what miglit prove a more favorable and popular view of the 
matter. I should seem to be indirectly soliciting the suffrages of the Syn- 
ods. The truth is. I find no call to speak now. The Board has not asked 
for my views : they know them and are satisfied. The niisrei)resentations 
of the St. Louis Presbyterian, (See Aug. 27). cannot be prevented by any 
statements of mine. Its errors have been repeatedly corrected by the 
Presbyterian of the West ; and the c-orrection is denounced as dishonest 
concealment of my actual opinions. The Synods know, or may know, the 
true ground that I occupy. It was taken twenty years ago. 

My views were first published in 1838, rei)ul)lished and widely circu- 
lated in 184.3 ; atid presented to the General Assembly in 184(;, in a speech 
of which Dr. Hodge speaks in the Princeton Review of that year. From 
that ground I have never varied and never exiH'ct to. I do not mean that 
my interpretation of every particular Scripture, especially in my Review 
of Junkin, remains unaltered : but the general principles I adhere to. 
And when I write again on the question, I desire to wiite as I did before, 
untrammeled by its relations to ;;ny personal concernment of mine. I 
am fully i>ersuaded that with the vast majority of our church, at least 
with the free states, there is a substantial agreement as to princi])les on 
the slavery question. The difference is as to the application of the prin- 
ciple. All agree that slavery is inconsistent with the Gospel, and ought to 
be abolished as soon as practicable. Most men will subscribe the senti- 
ment of John Randol])h. when he said "I envy not the head or the heart 
of the Northern man who will defend slavery on j)rinciple." But there 
are too many, I fear, (how many, and whether they are a majority, God 
only knows), who are resolved not to discuss the subject: not to aid in 
its discussion : not to speak of it ; if possible, not to think of it. It never 
appears in their pulpits ; is never heard in their prayers. They have i>er- 
suaded themselves that\ they are in no way responsible for slavei-y ; that 
they have no call to meddle with it : and then, it is a "vexed question" ; a 
vexatious question ; and it troubles our Israel as Elijah troubled Ahab. 
They regard the whole duty of Northern ministers and Northern Chris- 
tians, so far as slavery is concerned, to be summarily comprehended in the 
one word, mum ! Some there are who seem determined to ojjpose and de- 
nounce and destroy (ecclesiastically) every man who moves a wing, or 
opens the mouth, or peeps (Isa. 10:14) about it in any relation whatever. 

There is another portion of our church who, fully adopting the avowed 
principles of the church as expressed in her various pul)lic acts, and 
cordially detesting slavery, wish to see these principles carried out, made 
efficient. They wish the Presbyterian Church to bring her mighty moral 
power to bear upon the evil of slavery : not fanatically : not in the way of 
mad denunciation of men and brethren ; not by rending the body of Christ ; 
but rationally, soberly, wisely : and yet efficiently. They desire her testi- 
mony against this enormous and rapidly growing and rampant evil to be 
no longer a dead letter : an idle, antiquated testimony, which no man heeds, 
and for the open disregard of which the church itself is unconcerned ; but 
quick, and powerful, and sharper than a two-edged sword, as being the 
testimony which God himself has commissioned his church to utter in his 
name. 

Doubtless there may be some of this latter party who are for push- 
ing matters too fast; who do not ai)preciate the practical difficulties involv- 
ed in the eradication of an evil which has been taking root for centuries. 
Perhaps a few would even rend the church, to be rid of the resp(msibllity 
for slavery. But the responsibility cannot thus be got rid of, even were 

100 



both the church and the Union divided. As one people we have shared in 
the guilt; and come when and how it may. we shall share in the penalty. 

Now, no explanations, no logical definitions, no hair-splitting distinc- 
tions are available to harmonize these parties. The difference lies in the 
animus ; not in the understanding. The men who are for doing nothing, 
saying nothing, caring nothing, thinking nothing ; but simply for minding 
their own business, as they say. will not object to your principles ; they 
are not offended by them : they agree with you about them : it is the utter- 
ance of the principles which offends them. You may hold what views 
you please, if you will but cease to agitate the church ; i. e.. cease to preach 
them, teach them, write them, talk about them. (See Acts IV: 17. 18.) 

For myself, I belong to the party — no ! I belong to no party : I am 
one of those who hate slavery with a perfect hatred ; I say slavery, not 
the slaveholder. There are legal slaveholders whom I know and love 
and honor, as brethren in Christ .Tesus : and shall I x-eject those whom 
Christ receives? Quid bonum. What if I did? There may be men who 
even maintain the essential rightfulness of slavery, and simply contemn 
its abuses ; who yet evince the sinceriey of a Christian profession ; just as 
there were (and are) men who maintained on principle the dreadful des- 
potism of the Papacy : like Bernard, and Fenelon. and Pascal : who were 
not only Christians, but eminently holy men. I do not presume to sit in 
judgment upon men; but the system of slavery. I find no hesitation in 
pronouncing anti-republican, anti-scriptural, unrighteous, earthly, sensual, 
devilish. And I hesitate not to condemn the conduct of the slaveholder, so 
far as he may voluntarily, and for selfish ends sustain that relation; while 
I do not condemn him. 

From the depths of my soul, I loathe and abhor the system which 
treats a man as a thing. In its essential nature, it is a standing lie, a 
practical lie. I sucked in enmity to slavery with my mother's milk. I 
was taught to hate it on my father's knee ; a father who left even England 
that he might enjoy more freedom in thpse western wilds. The renewal 
of my heart by divine grace did but strengthen my inborn hatred of des- 
potism. Twenty years study of the Bible has given me the stronger as- 
surance that it condemns tyranny, and requires what is "just and equal." 
I wish to see our church animated by the spirit of the Bible toward 
slavery, not blindly denouncing men, but boldly and ardently maintaining 
principles. At present, it is all that the Presbyterian Church dare do, to 
point to the Act of 1818, and say. "We uttered our views some forty years 
since!" (Compare 2 Cor. VII: 11). Is this our zeal to approve ourselves 
clear in this matter? What we need is not nicely defined statements of 
principle; but love to God and man. zeal for the truth. — heart, soul. 
Our church, I fear, is lifted with pride of i)osition, which she is unwilling 
to compromise by opening her mouth for the dumb. Her numbers, her 
wealth, her worldly influence, her vast extent, her rapid growth, these are 
her pride and boast. Will not God blast this gourd of ours? But I must 
stop. I set out to write a note of ai)ology. Perhaps I have said enough to 
satisfy you that though all things arc lawful for me, all are not expedient ; 
among others, that of writing to the Synods about slavery. 

Ever yours, Tho. E. Thomas. 

TO MR. NATHANIEL FISHER, HIS FATHER-IN-LAW, 

The church readi/ to saerifice her principles. '-The whole south- 
ern press of our church connection denounced the Semi- 
nary^' 

New Albany. Ind.. 2 Oct.. 1857. 
* * * * As for our Chicago Seminary, I do not know how it will re- 
sult. The question of slavery, which disturbs everything in Church and 
State, has connected itself with our Seminary. Dr. MacMaster and I, and 

101 



all who were chiefly concerned in originating the effort, are known as 
anti-slavery men. Dr. N. L. Rice, of St. Louis, a very active and leading 
man in the Presbyterian Church, made war upon us from the first, as 
endeavoring to establish an abolition school. As he edited a religious news- 
paper, circulating over a considerable portion of our region, he has been 
able to obtain a good many adherents, and quite recently, chiefly through 
a very wealthy man in Chicago, who is an active i)ro-slavery Democrat, 
Dr. Rice has removed from St. Louis to Chicago, where he is to be pastor 
of a church. But it is not the influence of Dr. Rice alone which has pro- 
duced this opposition. The whole Southern press of our church connection, 
denounced the Seminary : and every Northern paper, but one. treated it 
coldly, or distrustfully. For almost a year, every influence which could 
be brought to bear against it has been exerted ; and the aim has been to 
bring the Seminary, if it must prosper, under the absolute control of the 
General Assembly ; supposing as its opponents do, that if controlled by 
that body. Dr. MacMaster and I would certainly l)e got rid of. There has 
been a good deal of discussion about the matter in the newspapers of the 
church : and great effort will be made to carry our Synods this fall, so as 
to secure our removal. I shall not attend any Synod, but leave them to do 
.iust what they think proper. I feel no personal anxiety in the matter. 
The whole opposition rests upon our opinions about slavery. I have no 
objection to be denounced on that ground : and if our church is willing 
to sacrifice her principles on that subject. I shall lament not the personal 
bearing of that action on my.self. but the humiliation of the chiu'ch herself. 
The Synods meet this month. The probability is that they will be divided 
three against four. In that case, nothing will be done at Chicago, for 
several years, in the way of building the Seminary. 

FROM HIS MOTHER, ON HIS BIRTHDAY. 

My very dear Son : Wilmington, O., Dec. 23d. 1857. 

I have purposely delayed answering your kind and interesting letter 
till to-day ; the date of which brings to my recollection an eventful period. 
Like Hannah of old. I had asked for a son ; and promised, if ni.v request 
were granted, I would train him up for the service of the sanctuary. 
The Lord heard my secret prayer: and granted my 'request : but not till 
he had severely tried m,y faith in the fiery furnace of affliction. Six weeks 
after being called to resign my dear Elizabeth, the Lord made up the 
breach by giving me a son. 

On receiving the blessing, the covenant engagement was renewed, and 
an ebenezer of gratitude erected in the hearts of the parents. After a 
sincere dedication, mutually, at the family altar, he was taken to the sanc- 
tuary, and there, before and in the presence of a very large congregation, 
was very solemnl.v dedicated to the service of (Jod, b.v his father, in bap- 
tism ; holding him in his arms, and calling upon the congregation to wit- 
ness his promise to train him in the fear of God, and devote him especially 
for His service, whether at home or abroad, and his willing acquiescence 
should he be sent to the ends of the earth. But little did we think at 
the time, that we should accompany him to the opposite side of the globe ; 
and least of all, that I should be spared to witness him, for twenty years, 
a faithful minister of the Gospel of salvation by .lesus Christ, and congrat- 
idate him upon his entrance on his forty-sixth year. If it be the Lord's 
will, may you be spared to testify His goodness, and constant, loving 
kindness, still manifested to you, and yours ; and be permitted to train 
some of them for similar service in the Sanctuary. 

May the Lord make you eminently useful in bringing many .«ouls to 
glory ! ! 

You are aware of the destitution at Wilmington, in consequence of the 
death of old Father Dickey, (whose end was peace), fifty-five years, a 

102 



preacher of righteousness, forty years to the people with whom he died. 
I suppose there will be no stated preaching in the Presbyterian Church 
for some time. 

I hear that in Seminary matters the war is still going on ; but your 
Father is at the helm, and will bring all out straight at the last. 

My best love to Lydia and all the dear children : and accept for .your- 
self all you wish from Youb Mother. 

FROM REV. J. M. WAMPLER, ASSOCIATE EDITOR OF THE 

PRESBYTER. 

Dr. Thomas asked to persuade Dr. MacMaster to silence. 

Cincinnati, O., April 23, 18.59. 

I want to write a few words to you which appear to me of consider- 
able importance. Dr. MacMaster has been here this morning, and will see 
you, perhaps, before this letter reaches you. We, of course, had some talk 
about Seminary matters. We are approaching the last struggle and crisis 
in this matter ; and a great deal may depend upon apparently trivial mat- 
ters. The signs of the times are becoming more and more favorable, as I 
think you will see in our next. So far, the prospect is for at triumph over 
Dr. Rice and those who follow his lead, but our triumph will be complete 
only in the elcetion of Dr. MacMaster, while at the same time, we will 
receive a professor second at least to none in the Presbyterian Church. If 
we fail in the last particular, it will be. as our former failures have Ijeen, 
through his own imprudence : and this is the point I write to you about. 
He has just been telling Dr. Monfort and myself some of the things he 
means to say. Even if themselves proper, if said by him in the way he 
usually says such things, he is gone, and we and right are defeated. 

Having forestalled Dr. Monfort with these designs of his, of course it 
is too late for him to dissuade him ; and as for me. I never have been his 
counsellor. But you and he have been mutual advisers, and I think you, if 
any one, can influence him. 

Now I do hope, if you approve my suggestion, you will urge it upon 
him. Don't say you can't do anything with him : you can, — you can get 
him to do anything you insist upon, and I beg of you. do it. If you suc- 
ceed, the day is ours. 

Note, In my father's diary appears this entry: "April 27, 
1859. Rev. Dr. E. D. MacMaster called and spent the day in 
conversation about the coming General Assembly and the North- 
west Theological Seminary. Urged him not to engage in any 
controversy about it before the Assembly; nor even to defend 
himself and friends against the assaults of Dr. Rice; but to leave 
the whole matter, under God, in the hands of the Assembly. He 
seemed persuaded himself that the way was closed against his 
personal participation in debate." 

TO REV. E. D. MACMASTER. D. D. 

Dr. Thomas declines to go the Assemhli/ on the Slavery question. 

Dayton, O., 16 May, 1859. 
My Dear Sir : 

Having been unusually engaged during the past week, since the receipt 
of yours of the 19th Inst., I have not been able to lay my hand on the ar- 

103 



tide you request, until this morning. I enclose it, and hope you will pre- 
serve it, as I may some day have occasion to use it. If I find a convenient 
opportunity, I wull send all my papers relating to this subject to Indian- 
apolis. You may have use for them ; but I hope you will not. 

As to the resignation of my quasi professorship, which you refer to, 
I am entirely resigned to whatever Providence may x»ermit the Assembly 
to do ; and I think no further resignation necessary. 

Our mutual friend, P. P. Lowe. Esq., has recently returned from a 
trip to Philadelphia. On his return he travelled with Dr. Hoge of Colum- 
bus, and had much conversation with him on seminary matters, as likely 
to be handled by the Assembly. Dr. Hoge expressed his intention to at- 
tend the Assembly, (as a lobby member. I suppose), and said he should 
favor the location of the Seminary at Chicago. He stated that $100,000 
would be funded then, for the maintenance of the professors, and ten 
acres of land given for a site. Mr. Lowe inquired the reasons of his oppo- 
sition to Indianapolis. He replied that the movement for that place was in 
the hands of Abolitionists. (I cannot say that he used this word). Mr. 
Ijowe asked the Doctor on what ground he himself stood in respect to 
slavery. The Doctor answered that he was an enemy to slavery and slav- 
ery extension ; but that he stood on the platform of 1818. Mr. Lowe re- 
plied that the Seminary men whom he (the Doctor) was opposing, occu- 
pied the same platform. That from long personal intercourse he could 
testify for Dr. MacMaster ; and that If he and Dr. Hoge could but compare 
views, there would be found no real difference as far as slavery is con- 
cerned. Mr. Lowe tells me that Dr. Hoge seemed impressed with the con- 
versation : and expressed the opinion that if Dr. Hoge could be conversed 
with at Indianapolis, his influence might be thrown into the other scale. 
What there may be in this, I cannot say. As Dr. Rice and Dr. Hoge were 
associated in the Cincinnati enterprise, it is not strange that they should 
sympathize now ; and It is reasonable to believe that Dr. Hoge, as an old 
pioneer in the West, will exert some influence over the members of the 
Assembly. 

I should be happy to meet you at Indianapolis, during the sessions of 
the Assembly ; but in the present posture of affairs. I cannot do so. Re- 
membering that the Lord reigneth, — I shall quietly wait the issue. 
Ever respectfully and affectionately 

Yours In Christian bonds, 

Tho. E. Thomas. 



104 



Great gathering in IncUanapolis at the Ass&mhlt/ of '59 of pro- 
slavery men and "Ch'adua lists". Who was there: what was 
done. Its chairman and ruling spirits, Rice, Palmer, Thorn- 
well, Samuel R. Wilson, Phimmer, Vandyke and D. X. 
Junkin. They tell Dr. MacMaster if he speaks he "commits 
ecclesiastical suicide''. His great speech. The last and final 
anti-slavery word in the church, until the war. Description 
of him speaking. His ^'lost sixthly" and Dr. Rice's ridicule. 
Dr. MacMaster is cast out; Dr. N. L. Rice is put in his 
place. 

This "issue", which mj father thus awaited at home, no one 
appears to have made any special preparation for, except Dr. 
MacMaster and Dr. N. L. Rice. As in the attempt to raise funds 
for endowment in 1857, so now, to the former the times were 
most unpropitious ; for this rear may not unfairly be said to 
mark a low ebb-point, unknown in former or later years, of cour- 
age and manliness in Northern anti-slavery sentiment. The As 
sembly met May 20, 1859, at Indianapolis ; and had in attendance 
more than any ordinary representation, both in numbers and 
ability of the leading pro-slavery men in the Presbyterian Church 
from both the North and South. 

The Rev. Dr. Wm, L. Breckenridge of Kentucky was Modera- 
tor. A few years before, he with Dr. E. P. Humphrey, had man- 
fully defended the views of Dr. MacMaster on the subject of 
slavery against the attacks of Dr. N. L. Rice; but now he "saw 
things through a Kentucky mist." Nothing could be more try- 
ing than the position of border state men, wiio, because of their 
character and consciences, were of necessity genuine opponents 
of slavery. Later on they rose admirably to the occasion, and not 
only supported the government, but were foremost in bringing 
about the extermination of slavery when opportunity offered. 
Rut in 1859, this worthy class, of whom Dr. Wm. L. Breckenridge 
was a good type, stood convinced that the duty of the church 
on this subject then, "was summarily comprehended by the word 
mum." 

The opening sermon before the Assembly was by Dr. N. L. 
Rice. 

105 



The chairman of the most important committee — Bills 
and Overtures — was Dr. Rice. The chairman of the com- 
mittee on Theological Seminaries was Dr. B. M. Palmer, 
of New Orleans, afterward notorious for his "Vindication of 
Secession and the South," who said "The })rovidential trust 
of the Southern people is to conserve and perpetuate the insti- 
tution of slavery as now existing." * The ruling spirit in this 
Assembly, and probably its ablest delegate, was Dr. Thornwell, 
a professor in the Theological Seminary of Columbia, S. C, 
who said the government must organize labor; and "the only 
way in which it can be done, as a permanent arrangement, is 
by converting the laborer into capital ; that is, by giving the em- 
ployer a right of property in the labor employed ; in other words, 
by slavery." So much for the humanitarianism and [>olitical 
economy of this distinguished divine ! 

Following the lead of and supporting these men, among the 
delegates, were Dr. S. R. Wilson of Cincinnati;* Dr. James H. 
Brooks, of St. Louis ; Dr. Hoge, of Columbus, O. ; Dr. Plummer ; 
Dr. H. J. Vandyke; Rev. Mr. Lourie, and other well-known pro 
slavery Presbyterian ministers. Dr. Geo. Junkin's brother was 
there — Dr. D. X, Junkin — who thought in 1874 that abolitionism 
had reached its height in 1845. Prof. D. H. Hill,* then an elder 
in the Presbyterian Church and teacher in a college in North 
Carolina, and afterwards the left arm of Gen. Lee in the army of 
Northern Virginia, was there. Of him and such as he. this was 
the last Northern raid till Gettysburgh. 

Yet, most of these men, and their following, even at this time, 
could with difficulty be induced to consent to exclude Dr. Mac 
Master from the Seminary which he had labored so long and 
faithfully to build up. Reading the utterances of his ministerial 
career, they "could find no evil in him." Dr. J. G. Monfort of 
the ^^ Herald and Presbyter, " of Cincinnati, was the most active 
of the friends of Dr. MacMaster upon the floor of the Assembly ; 
and he has told me that Dr. Thornwell opposed the removal of 
Dr. MacMaster from his old Professorship. Did he feel that to 

* "The South : Her Peril aud Her Duty." A Thanksgiving Day Sermon 
—Nov. 29, 1860. 

* Rev. Dr. S. R. Wilson published at Cincinnati a political sermon 
with this motto: "Blot out the Stars and leave the Stripes. Why?" He 
also wrote in ISQ^the Louisville "Declaration and Testimony." 

* Two years before he had published a school text book, called "Ele- 
ments of Algebra," in which appears this problem : "The field of battle 
at Buena Vista is six aud one-half miles from Saltillo. Two Indiana vol- 
unteers ran away from the field of battle at the same time: one ran half 
a mile per hour faster than the other, and reached Saltillo five minutes 
and fifty-four and six-elevenths seconds sooner than the other. Required 
their respective rates of travel," 

106 



do so was unehivalroiis? Or at the aggressions of the slave power 
across the line, of which this transaction was a fair sample, al- 
though of small importance in itself, did he have in his ears, as 
a low and distant hum, the rising indignation of the North? 
This must have two years yet to gather, then it was heard around 
the world ! Hon. Jesse L. Williams, of Ft. Wayne, was, among 
the delegates, a warm friend of Dr. MacMaster, and he and his 
colleagues had reason to believe that Dr. Rice's schemes would 
yet fail, provided Dr. MacMaster could be induced to keep still. 
But he had not gone to Indianapolis to keep still, and no per- 
suasions could move him : he had gone there to ''bear a testimony" 
against "a pusillanimity which had never yet failed to yield all 
which impudence demanded of it;'' to ask *'when would the 
Northwest, and the church and the nation cease to be a humiliat- 
ing and deplorable spectacle, but awaken as a strong man from 
sleep, and recover herself from the Circean cup of the Pro-slavery 
Power, in which it had been so long held ;" to ask, "the defenders 
of slavery if they were so ignorant as to think that a system such 
as that could be established in this day when, throughout the 
whole world, all the old, long-established systems of robbery and 
oppression were crumbling in the dust ;" and this he did in a 
speech, the like of which is not often heard in any Assembly. 
When he had finished, all possibility of his own election had van- 
ished. The vote was taken, and next morning my father, at 
Dayton, made the following entry in his Diary : 

"May 30, 18.59. Learned from the Cincinnati Gazette to-day tliat Dr. 
Rice is elected Professor of Theology in Northwestern Theological Seaii 
nary by 314 votes ; Dr. MacMaster receiving only 4.5, and scattering nine. 
A wonderful triumph of ambition, injustice, dishonesty and pro-slavery- 
ism! Our church is sold to the South. But God reigns and will order all 
things well. This is a sad and humiliating termination of all our toils 
and cares for a Northwest Seminary in which a rational but decided 
anti-slavery tone might be imparted to the rising ministry of the country." 

No one disputed the ability of Dr. MacMaster's speech, but 
it was not listened to. The address, prepared with elaborate 
care, was read from MS. A reporter for a Cincinnati paper, with 
the Doctor's consent, took the sheets as he laid them down, dur- 
ing the delivery; but his train hour arriving, the reporter seized 
what he could lay hands on, and took himself o!T, Soon Dr. Mac- 
Master was broken off in discourse, and looking for some time 
for the missing sheets, exclaimed in child-like despair to those 
about him "Where is my Sixthly? Who has taken my Sixthly?'' 
Dr. Rice and his friends took up the cry ; and, moving about on 
the floor of the Assembly asked "Who of you has Dr. MacMaster's 
Sixthly?" Because of his love of accuracy, of proportion, of 
method and moderation, Dr. MacM. always preferred to speak 
from his prepared and written page; but he was a conversation-, 
alist of brilliant power; and, when aroused, was an extempore 
preacher such as any man in a lifetime is not often permitted to 

107 



hear. I well remember as a little boy, — though I could not under- 
stand, — his occasional sermons in the liank ^Ureet Church in 
New Albany ; the hushed and intent audience, the striking figure 
of the speaker, over six feet high and with white, silky hair; the 
measured, frugal use of well chosen words in long, involved sen- 
tences; which wandered out, and came back again, and finally 
ended like a trip-hammer, in something which startled those 
about me, and made them exchange looks of pleasure and sur- 
prise. Finding his MS. gone, the Doctor turned upon his audi- 
ence, and gave them a full equivalent for his missing pages. I 
have heard of many minor things in this speech,— among them his 
promise "to meet Thornwell and Palmer at Philippi," referred 
to afterward in my father's letter of June 12, 18G(;, — none of 
which appear in its printed copy; and I have supposed these to 
have been uttered in lieu of his lost "Sixthly." 

Dr. Rice and his friends claimed that "Hanover College was 
a failure; and there was no wonder if this Seminary should 
have been likewise." Dr. R. admitted on the floor of the Assem- 
bly that he had written editorially in his St. Louis paper; "It is 
evidently the design of Drs. MacMaster and Thomas to establish 
an Abolition Institution in the Northwest, and train up young 
men to divide the church.'' The speech of Dr. Rice, in reply to 
Dr. MacMaster, was not reported stenographically ; but, he 
charged Dr. M. with obtruding upon the Assembly his personal 
ambitions ; ridiculed and defied him ; told him to print his 
speech; to double the edition, and he would pay half of the 
expense. 

With Dr. Rice, the Assembly elected to fill the other Profes- 
sorships, Dr. Willis Lord, Dr. L. J. Halsey and Dr. W. M. Scott, 
son-in-law of Dr. Chas. Hodge. They were, in fact, named by 
Dr. Rice, and held his views regarding slavery ; but were men of 
milder type. Later on, (June 12, 1866), my father wrote to Dr. 
MacMaster that "he would find a valuable body of co-laborers in 
Drs. Halsey, Lord and Elliott," the latter of whom had taken the 
place of Dr. W. M. Scott. 

I have sought unsuccessfully to obtain the names of the 
forty-five delegates who voted for Dr. MacMaster: no son will 
ever be ashamed to find his father's name upon that list. I ap- 
pend the final page of Dr. MacMaster's printed speech. — A. A. T. 

"It is with extreme reluctance and profound regret, tliat I bring out, 
in the form I here do, opinions, and sentiments, and practices, on this 
subject of slavery, which I think are not honorable to the Church. I 
have known these things, as from time to time, through ten years past, 
they have come to light, with other things of like bearing of earlier date. 
I have known these things, and have kept silence. I have kept silence, 
because I desired peace, — my own peace, — I hope, still more the peace of 
the Church. I have kept silence, because I have always deprecated violent 
agitation over particular forms of evil, which is so apt to run into exag- 
gerations and extremes, damaging alike to personal character and to the 
best interests of truth and righteousness. 1 have kept silence, because I 

108 



have no aptitudes and no taste for such conflicts. I liave kept silence, 
because I have Icnown somethins: of the manifold complications and diffi- 
culties of this whole problem of slavery and the slave population, and be- 
cause it has long been my settled conviction, that men living in the midst 
of slavery, and to whom immediately and chiefly it belongs, alone are 
competent to deal wisely with it. and to devise and execute measures for 
abating its evils, and effecting ultimately its abolition. Gladly would I 
have continued to be silent, as I have been habitually silent concerning 
the relations of the Church to the whole subject. 

But when the minions of that Pro-Slavery Power which has, through 
a long series of years, so prostituted and demoralized the administration 
of our noble political system, to the protection, perpetuation, and extension 
of slavery, obtrude themselves into our heritage in these free states, and, 
on our own free soil, professedly in the interest of slavery, impudently in- 
terfere with us when quietly prosecuting, upon our own field, the work 
of the Church, and wrest from us an institution established for its serv- 
ice, then. I say, that the question is no longer about the slavery of the ne- 
groes, but whether we ourselves shall be brought in bondage to this impu- 
dent and odious domination. Is Liberty, born of Christianity, baptized in , 
the blood of our fathers, rocked in the cradle of Presbyterianism, amidst 
the shock of arms in the battles of the old Dutch Republic and on the 
brave old hills of Scotland, and standing up here, so proudly in the full- 
ness of its strength, in this great land, the land of the free and the home 
of the brave, is Liberty to perish at last here among American Presbyter- 
ians? This is the question which I ask all right-hearted Presbyterians to 
ponder well, to lay up in their hearts, and to make the subject of their 
meditations. 

"No : Liberty shall not so perish. Truth and righteousness shall not 
be so borne down, and their voice smothered. This great wrong against 
the Church herself shall not be perpetrated for sake of slavery, so utterly 
heterogeneous and alien to our principles, our character, and our spirit, 
as a people. Let not the enemies of the Presbyterian Church reproach her. 
Let not the nncircumcised in heart rejoice over her. It may be she sleeps : 
but her heart waketh. Soon she will hear the voice of her Lord, touching 
this anomalous and heterogeneous thing, and will arise to vindicate her 
honor, to reiterate her ancient testimonies, and to renew her labors, to 
correct the errors of former times, and as speedily as possible to efface 
this blot on our holy religion, and to obtain the complete abolition of slav- 
ery throughout Christendom, and if possible throughout the world." 

Entries in Dr. Thomas's diarij, when John Broicn tens hung. Dit- 
to, ivhen the ftag came doum on Fort Humpter. 

Friday, Dec. 2, 1859. "Ossawatomie Brown (John), hanged to-day in 
Virginia, as a traitor, for his mad inroad at Harper's Ferry. A stern 
Cromwellian fanatic; but probably a much better man than those who exe- 
cute him. The Lord x'eigueth : let the earth I'ejoice" ! 

Tuesday, Dec. 27, 1859. "Dr. E. D. MacMaster called and spent the 
day. Talked over the propriety of establishing a monthly magazine of 
anti-slavery character." 

"20 Dec, 1860, South Carolina seceded". 

Jany. 10, 1861. "The State of Mississippi yesterday seceded from the 
Union, by 32 to 15 votes in the Convention. Yesterday, also, THE FIRST -' 
GUN FIRED in the coming Civil War! The Charleston forts fired on the 
U. S. Steamer, Star of the West, sent to re-enforce Maj. Anderson at Ft. 
Sumpter. ^ 

May God- defend the right, and deliver the oppressed !" ! 

Ap. 13. To-day's Gazette informs us that at 4 a. m. on yesterday, ^ 
Friday, April 12, the Rebels of South Carolina, after demanding the sur- 

109 



render of Fort Sumpter, OPENED FIRE ; arid so has begun the long- 
expected WAR between our Government, and the rebels of the slave-hold- 
ing South. May a just God, the righteous Judge, decide the contest ; 
giving deliverance to the oppressed slaves, whose cry has so long ascended 
to heaven ! 

FROM REV. E. D. MACMASTER, D. D. 

Dr. MacMaster in retirement. His views as ''a looker-on in 
Venice", regarding the intentions, hopes and fate of the 
slave power. 

Poland, Ohio, January 1st, 1861. 
Rev. and dear Sir: 

It is the first day of the new year. Although not much ^iven to observe 
"days". I avail myself of the occasion to offer to you. your wife, and your 
daughters, and your sons, my salutations, and my best wishes that it may 
be to you a happy year. I add : not, like a Spaniard, the wish that you 
may live a thousand years; — for who would live alway? — but my prayer 
that you may live as many years as you desire, and that they may be to 
you, and all yours, happy years. 

I remember with much interest the many pleasant hours I spent with 
you in the days of years now gone by. — hours from which I had both en- 
joyment and profit. The current events of the present times minister sub- 
jects of remark, and food for reflection : and the shadows cast before of 
coming events give occasion for expectation. Of the latter, the most nota- 
able are the prospective issue of the strange revolution still in 
progress in "the Flowery Land" — the prospective dissolution of "the Sick 
Man", — and the prospective disintegration of that ugly conglomerate, the 
Hapsburgh horn of the ugly "beast" which the Seer of Patmos saw arising 
out of the abyss. Of the former the most remarkable are, the stripping of 
poor old Pio Nono of his ancient patrimony, and the consolidation of the 
little States of that renowned Peninsula, so long rent by their own internal 
distractions, in one Italian nationality, and under institutions as liberal 
as they are yet able to bear : and the violent talk of our own confederacy, 
in theinterest of slavery propagandism. I say the talk of disruption ; for 
I am not yet clear that anything more is meant than talk, and whatever 
talk may be able to extort from a pusillanimity which has never yet failed 
to yield all which impudence has demanded of it. 

I have supposed, indeed, for many years that there are in the South 
traitors who, seeing their own section, under the blight of slavery, more 
and more continually overshadowed by the Free States of the North, if 
they thought it could be done, would be willing, and more than willing, 
to carry off from the present Union as many as they can of the Slave 
States, and, adding by conquest to these Cuba and the weak and barbar- 
ous States of Mexico and of Central America, to form on the sunny shores 
of the Gulf a new Confederacy over which they might bear rule. They 
would thus have a society after their own heart ; black slaves for the "mud- 
sills ;" above these a class of "poor whites" for artizans and shop-keepers, 
and over all themselves as an aristocracy, owning the land, and, as lords 
of the domain, holding all political power. 

The only question is, whether these men be so ignorant as to think that 
a system such as that can be established in this day when, throughout the 
whole world, all the old and long-established systems of robbery and op- 
pression are crumbling into dust. I have been afraid not only of the ring- 
streaked and speckled "Democracy" but of the old chronic spirit of com- 
promise, of which that respectable, staid, intelligent, conservative, moral, 
pious body, the old lady Whiggery, some years ago died, that it might be 

110 



revived in the Republic-an body. Certainly a very fit representative of the 
spirit, and a very fit administrator de bonis non upon the effects of that 
very respectable defunct old lady was found in that very grave, serious- 
minded, earnest, staunch-principled, pure, and godly person, the Hon. Tom. 
Corwin. 

Perhaps that danger is past. Some inconvenience, possibly some dis- 
turbance of public order, may arise from the wicked weakness, or the weak 
wickedness, of the poor "Old Public Functionary." who makes it so hard 
a trial for us to obey the Divine precept, "Thou shalt not speak evil of 
the ruler of thy people." Perhaps we may find forgiveness of our offenses 
in the plea, "I wist not that he was the Ruler.'" My fears for the country 
do not arise from the violent talk of the traitors in the South, but from the 
remembrance that God is just. Nearly twelve years ago. in reference to 
the then recent spoliation of abject Mexico in the interest of slavery-propa- 
gandism, I remember to have said and printed these words : "If there be a 
God in the heavens that judgeth among the nations, I think that this na- 
tion, however it may for the time have seemed to triumph in the wrong, 
has an unsettled ease in controversy, upon which judgment is yet to be 
rendered by the righteous Judge of all the earth. He looked for judgment, 
but. lo, blood ! for righteousness, but. lo. the cry of the oppressed !" I 
think I afterwards repeated these words in your pulpit. In having given 
utterance to them I claim no prophetic foresight. The end was open, 
even from the beginning, to the vision of all who had eyes to see. Per- 
haps the day of reckoning is already come. I pray God to give our coun- 
try repentance for its sins, and to send to it a good deliverance out of all 
its troubles. 

I observe these events, my dear sir, only as "a looker-on in Venice," 
from the streets, into which I have been thrust out. for the offense of 
having said such things as I here recite. I am not, however, an indifferent 
spectator of these events. I feel a deep interest in the race to which I 
belong ; a deep interest especially in my country ; above all, a deep interest 
in the Kingdom of God. the Church of our Lord, which He bought with 
His own blood. 

As to myself, from whom, and of whom, your goodness has induced 
you, from time to time, to ask that you might hear, I am at present enjoy- 
ing the hospitalities of my brother's house. Just now I am, with him. in 
the midst of the "Metaphysics", so called, of Sir William Hamilton, the 
Lectures published the year before the last, but which I have not till now 
foimd time to read. 

If I be not mistaken, the Scotch Knight has been overrated. Perhaps 
I may rank him higher, when I shall have read him through to the end. 
So far as I have gone, he seems to me to have been a man of more reading 
than reflection, of more memory than judgment, of more dogmatism than 
discrimination. I will not add that he seems to me to have been a man of 
more phantasy than philosophy ; for much of his writings show him to have 
been a very able man ; and his "philosophy of the conditioned", developed 
in these "Discourses", though even that needs to be set in a clearer light, 
establishes his claim to have been a profound thinker on subjects on which 
he had fully and maturely thought. For his philosophic temper and man- 
ners it is impossible to have a very high respect. To Reid. whom he 
treats with respect, he certainly is not just. His uniform treatment of 
Brown ; who. though perhaps not a very profound philosopher, was a man 
of genius, of brilliant gifts, and of great personal amiability ; leads one to 
suspect that such spleen has its origin in some personal pique. In listen- 
ing to the burly and brusque knight, one cannot but think, how different 
the manner of the man from that of the gentlemanly Dugald Stewart ! 

I expect, when the Spring opens, to turn myself, for a few weeks, per- 
haps a few months, to secular employment. I shall do this, not that I 
like it. But I think it to be necessary to seek for the present means of 

111 



subsistence for myself aud those dependent on me, and for the future 
some provision, that, if God spare my life, I shall not, when I am old, be 
dependent for my bread on the charity of the world, which, it is said, is 
cold ; nor on the charity of the church by whose very faithful love I have 
In times past been so greatly enriched. This statement is due to the kind- 
ness which has prompted your inquiries. In respect to my occupation for 
the future, I am not without some plans. But as the song runs, "The 
best-laid schemes o' mice an' men gang aft a gley ;" so it is not worth while 
to say much at present about these plans. This, however, I may say, that 
it is no part of my plans to go into a hole of the rocks, or a cave of the 
f^arth, in a grand disgust of the world, whether the world without the 
church, or the world within the church. 

FROM REV. E. D. MACMASTER, D. D. 
His retirement: intentions: opinion of Dr. Chas. Hodge. 

My dear Brother: Poland, Ohio, January 15th, 1861. 

Your obliging favor of the 8th instant has been duly received ; 
and I very cordially reciprocate its fraternal sentiments. 

The receipt of your letter ought to have been sooner acknowl- 
edged; but it came to me in the midst of the services of the com- 
munion in my brother's church, the larger share of which he had 
devolved on me. I might, indeed, have found time to write; but 
the truth is, I had not anything I cared to say on the only point 
which seemed to require an immediate reply. 

It was the latter part of my letter which was uppermost in 
my mind, when I made the suggestion I did concerning it ; what 
goes before being regarded as a kind of tug to lug it in. Expect- 
ing when the spring opens, to go out into a desert place, to build 
there a little cottage, a kind of lodging-place in the wilderness of 
a wayfaring man, under the cover of which I might have a place 
where to lay my head, and to plant corn, that I might have bread 
to eat, I hesitated between the feeling that I ought perhaps to 
give some account of myself, such as every man owes to his breth- 
ren, on the one hand, and, on the other, an unwillingness to ob- 
trude myself and my private affairs on a community, my claims 
on whose attention might he questionable. But I despise little 
devices, to do little things by indirection ; and this is a little 
thing for me to be writing letter after letter about. I would 
rather it should not be thought, either that I have willingly aban- 
doned my duty, or that, having been violently thrust out by the 
elders, and chief priests, and scribes, I have gone away to pout, 
like a petulant child in the sulks, or to growl like a dog in his 
kennel with a sore head. But, if you have not sent my letter to 
the Presbyter, it may be better to let the thing drop : if you have 
already sent it, it is no matter. I beg you to pardon this long 
talk de me ipsojiiet. 1 shall try not to err again in the same way. 

As to the ''plans" of which you inquire, I meant just what 
I said : that their execution is so uncertain that it is not worth 

112 



while to say much about them. There are some studies which I 
desire to prosecute. There are, too, some topics of theology, 
which, it has seemed to me, might be stated more satisfactorily 
than is done jn the books. A history of the Old Testament 
Church, for which there are materials in various works, but not 
anywhere reduced to proper form, has seemed to me to be a de- 
sideratum. I think, too, that there is a present call for a histor- 
ical review of the past devious course, and present dubious posi- 
tion of the Presbyterian Church, with past efforts and prospective 
results, in relation to slavery ; and I acknowledge I am in pain to 
be delivered of the conception. Our rulers need to have some 
seasonable words spoken into their ears : the more honest part of 
our ministers and people to have their perplexities solved, and 
the things within them which are ready to die strengthened. 
Perhaps this is a time when men will have an ear to hear. But 
whether I shall be able to say what ought to be said, and find 
money enough to print it, I am not certain. And as to the other 
matters, of more general and permanent interest, whether I shall 
be able to do anything in them is doubtful. 

I was much interested in the account of your Fast day exer- ' 
cise. I hope the word did the hearers good as it doeth the upright 
in heart. There was some holding forth of the word in this place 
also, and I presume in many other places, the same day. I hope 
the fast of the pious Saint James has not been in vain. Will not 
your Dayton people publish your sermon? It is a shame, if they 
do not. I remember very well your two sermons in 1847, which 
I read at the time with care and much interest. I ought to have 
acknowledged the receipt of your sermon on the death of Dr. 
Haines, which I read with interest, for sake of the subject and 
for the author's sake. 

You ask what I think of Dr. Hodge's article on the state of 
the country. I think it is, like other articles gotten up by the 
same cook, a hodge-podge. In what he says of the main causes 
and the objects of the treason, there is much truth which it may 
be well for those who sympathize with and half justify the 
treason to hear. But, in his concessions, expositions, and propos- 
ed compromises, there is an assumption of the same false defini- 
tions of slavery which has filled all his articles on the subject 
with confused talk, perplexing the minds of the simple, and the 
same old leaven of a temporizing spirit, which has so extensively 
and so long leavened the mass of the body, of which he is so true 
a representative. 

Another article showing this, and the large share it has had 
in corrupting the mind and heart of the church and country and 
producing the present troubles, would be eminently proper to the 
occasion. I shall include this in my tractate, if I print anything 
on the subject. I prefer, however, that at present nothing be 
said of this. But, in the deliverance of our beloved brother 

113 



Charles, there are some things which our Southern brethren will 
think hard to be understood : for example, w^hen he says that, 
till lately the advocate of disunion would have been put into the 
same category with Benedict Arnold, and he doubts not that is 
the place which history will assign to all such ; — a saying which, 
however, is very characteristically taken back in an erratum at 
the end of the Number. That it got utterance by brother Charles 
is among the signs that the world moves. 

Sketch of his life. His great influence and position in the church 
and on the slavery controversy. "To Drs. Junkin and Rice 
and others upholding the cause of slavery, he brought a 
watchful and unceasing aid, comfort and support." How, 
and' Why? Miami student at Princeton Seminary iviites 
on the subject. 

Note. Rev. Dr. Charles Hodge. This is probably the sever- 
est criticism of Dr. Charles Hodge by any of his cotemporaries ; 
and is one that a careful examination of his record shows to 
have been w^holly deserved. At any rate, it must go as the opin- 
ion of a man thoroughly competent to express an opinion ; for 
there is reason to believe that Dr. MacMaster had watched Dr. 
Hodge's position and influence in the slavery contest in the Pres- 
byterian Church in the West, more closely than Dr. Hodge had 
himself. 

The lovable qualities of his character, and the fascination 
for my father of his winning personality, are well told by Dr. 
Thomas in his letter from the General Assembly of Philadelphia, 
June 2d, 1846 : that impression seems never to have been affected ; 
nor could he willingly admit about Dr^ Hodge what Dr. MacMas- 
ter states in this letter. 

The Rev. Charles Hodge, D. D., LL. D., was born in Phila- 
delphia in 1797, and died at Princeton in 1878. His father was 
of Scotch-Irish descent, a graduate of Princeton College, was a 
surgeon in the Revolutionary army, and afterward practiced 
medicine in Philadelphia : his mother, of French-Hugenot descent, 
was born and passed her early life in Boston. Charles Hodge was 
graduated at Princeton College, and, in 1816 entered the Theo- 
logical Seminary there, where he seems to have imbibed the bib 
^ lical view of slavery taught by Dr. Samuel Miller: he certainly 
never learned such a lesson of Dr. Ashbel Green, then President 
of Princeton College. In 1822, Charles Hodge was elected Profes- 
sor in Princeton Theological Seminary, where he maintained 
himself with growing and distinguished honor and usefulness for 
over fifty years. In 1825, he established the Biblical Repertory, 
/^) which, assisted chiefly by other Princeton professors, he contin- 
ued to edit and conduct until his death ; its early design l)eing 
"to assist ministers and laymen in the criticism and interpreta- 

114 



tion of the Bible''. Its name was afterwards changed to the 
"Biblical Repertory and Princeton Review", by which latter 
name it has since been known. In such a position, supported and 
adorned by all the graces of manner and character and high 
scholarship, and a marvelous industry ; and, in large part, 
through this Review, Charles Hodge and his associates such as 
the Alexanders and others of like attainments, made the Prince- 
ton influence dominant in the Old School branch of the Presby- 
terian Church in the United States — surely no contemporarj' so 
long exerted an equal influence in any other church, at home or 
abroad. 

In 1836, from the pen of Dr. Charles Hodge, in the Princeton 
Review, appeared an article asserting the biblical sanction of 
slavery, in these words : 

"It is on all hands acknowledged that at the time of the advent of 
Jesus Christ, slavery in its worst forms prevailed over the whole world. 
The Saviour found it around him in Judea ; the apostles met with it in 
Asia, Greece and Italy. How did they treat it? Not by the denunciation 
of slaveholding as necessarily and universally sinful. * * * * The subject 
is hardly alluded to by Christ in any of his personal instructions. * * * * 
The assumption that slaveholding is itself, a crime, is not only an error, 
but an error fraught with the worst of consequences". 

No one can briefly tell or easily exaggerate the harm that 
such utterance from such a quarter exerted in the Presbyterian 
Church at that day, and during the period of a whole generation. 
This doctrine was taught to students in Princeton Seminary, who 
became its missionaries throughout the land, north and south. 
It was, Dr. Hodge afterwards stated, 'inculcated by southern 
men all over the South";* was eagerly welcomed by all pro-slavery 
men, for here was at once a sedative to their consciences, and an 
argument and an authority of which they stood greatly in need. 
This quotation, as an authority, appears over and over again in 
the literature of the slavery controversy in the church, and was 
always both text and evidence with the northern defenders of 
slavery, like Drs. Junkin and Rice. Nor was the harm confined 
within the limits of the church. When the brutal supporters of 
Slavery in St. Louis assembled there in public meeting to stifle 
free speech and encourage a mob which murdered Lovejoy, they 
had in their mouths the words of Rev. Dr. Charles Hodge, and, 

"RESOLVED, that the Sacred writings furnish abundant evidence of 
the existence of slavery from the earliest periods. The patriarchs possess- 
ed slaves : our Savior recognized the relation between master and slave, 
and deprecated it not : hence, we know he did not condemn that relation ; 
on the contrary. His disciples, in all countries, designated their respective 
duties to each other : therefore 

"RESOLVED, that we consider slavery, as it exists now in the United 
States, as sanctioned by the Sacred Scriptures". 

* Letter of Chas. Hodge to Dr. J. C. Bachus. p. 464 of Life of Dr. 
C. Hodge, by his son. 

115 



After this publication by Dr. Charles Hodge, the only genuine 
effort to remove slavery by an amendment to the constitution of 
any southern state, was made by the Emancipationists of Ken- 
tucky in 1840, which movement, it is fair to say, had Dr. Hodge's 
active and hearty support. The Rev. R. J. Breckenridge, who led 
in this attempt, in a printed address to the people there before 
its disastrous failure, said; "The burden of the disquisitions of 
those who wished to foster, enlarge and perpetuate slavery in 
Kentucky, was the divine origin of the right of property in 
man, the marked approval of slavery by Christ and His Apos- 
tles", etc. Yet Dr. Hodge "held that slavery was a great evil, 
and ought to be somehow and sometime brought to an end." * 
and he wanted it to go by natural and ])eaceful modes of death". 
These he defined as,""(i) the increase of the slave population 
until it reached the point of being unproductive; and <2) the grad- 
ual elevation of the slaves in knowledge, virtue and property to 
the point at which it would be no longer desirable and possible 
to keep them in bondage." * 

Dr. Hodge idealized slavery and held that its ordinary inci- 
dents were abuses which^ should be corrected. His son claims 
Dr. Hodge's view and position on slavery was substantially that 
of Dr. Robert J. Breckenridge. But the latter had written. 

"Out upon such folly! the man who cannot see that Ameri- 
can slavery, as it exists among us, is founded on the principle 
of taking by force that which is another's, has simply no moral 
sense". 

In 1843, Dr. Wm. Cunningham, afterwards Principal of the 
New College, Edinburgh, visited the United States at the head 
of a new delegation of the Free Church of Scotland. The aboli- 
tionists had great hopes of good from this visit, relying on his 
well-known love of freedom. Dr. Hodge used all his arts to disap- 
point all such hope, and with a measure of success. On his 
return. Dr. C. wrote to him (Ibid, p. 357) from Edinburgh: "I 
succeeded in preventing our Assembly from doing anything on 
the subject of slavery," except appointing a committee to con- 
sider it, and I shall do what I can to get them to do as little as 
possible", (p. 357). But it was hard to hold such a man long 
■ in the sophistical meshes which Dr. Hodge had woven about 
him; and later, he writes: "I am not satisfied of the soundness 
of some of the principles in your article on Abolitionism in the 
Repertory. I cannot see how any human being can justly and 
validly lose his own personal, natural right to control his time 
and labor, unless the element either of his own consent or of 
penal infliction for a crime proven be brought in", (p. 301). 

What wonder that Dr. Cunningham filed his protest against 

* Life by his son, p. 356. 

* Essays and Reviews by Dr. C. Hodge, pp. 505-G. 

116 



the doctrine here taught by his friend I How can anyone read 
pages 558 et seq., of this article on Abolitionism * without realiz- 
ing that Dr. Hodge is here defending slavery on principle,* and 
adroitly whittling away the foundation of any such possible 
thing as human rights ! 

From 183(5 until after 1860, Dr. Hodge brought to the min- 
isters of his church in the West and South who were upholding 
the cause of slavery, a watchful and unceasing aid, comfort and 
support. One may fairly question whether there are many who 
can now read Dr. Geo. Junkin's biblical defence of slavery with- 
out some sense of shame. It met Dr. Hodge's warmest approval ; 
and, with its caustic "Review'' by Dr. Thomas, were the 
publications which elicited the article on Abolitionism in 
the Princeton Review. One of the outcomes of the anti- 
slavery activity set on foot by Dr. Bishop, at Oxford, O., was 
the final expulsion from the New School branch of the Presby- 
terian Church of the Rev. Wm. Graham ; for the New School 
people would not endure on this subject what was robust ortho- 
doxy in the Old School branch. Graham published in his defence, 
a pamphlet called "The Contrast; or the Bible and Abolitionism"; 
and this publication and that of Dr. Geo. Junkin were noticed 
in the Princeton Review, (p. 310, vol. 20), by Dr. Hodge, as 
follows: 

"These two pamphlets, refuting the unscriptural arguments of the 
Abolitionists, derive a singular interest from their origin. The substance 
of both was pronounced in ecclesiastical bodies, to-wit. the Old School and 
New School Synods of Cincinnati ; both were produced in a State which is 
exempt from the ills of slavery ; and both were written by men who are 
natives of free States. We will add. that both are in a degree interesting 
and cogent. Mr. Graham's examination of the scriptural passages touching 
slavery is cool, patient, and clear from all extraneous matter. His ar- 
gument is so purely a reiteration of undeniable scripture statement, that 
we hold it to be unanswerable. Dr. Junkin's discourse takes a wider 
range, and, as founded on the same plain Scriptures, is in like manner a 
triumphant vindication of Christian rights, in this matter. Much of the 
fanaticism of our age is manifested in seeking to be holier than the law of 
God : hence the remarkable concurrence in argument and spirit, of the 
extreme polemics, on Oaths, on Total Abstinence, on War and Peace, and 
on Slavery. If slavery is ever to he ahoUshed, it must he hy means less 
desperate, than the attempt to prove that it teas condemned hy the inspired 
writers." 

Rev. Dr. Hodge noted and approved the taking possession of 
the Northwestern Theological Seminary by the pro-slavery men, 
one of whom was his own son-in-law, and he was, according to 
the statement of his son and biographer, active and influential in 
bringing about the election to a professorship in Princeton Semi- 
nary, by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, in 1860, 

* See Princeton Review. Vol. 20 p. .558 et seq.. 1844. 

* "I envy neither the head nor the heart of that Northern man who 
will defend slavery on principle", — John Randolph. 

117 



of a man* who avowed that "the providential trust of the Southern 
I^eople was to conserve and perpetuate the institution of slavery 
as now existing". To do justice to Dr. Chas. Hodge, as well as 
to further substantiate some of the statements above made, may 
require an examination, which space and time do not now ])ermit, 
into the teaching of some of the other professors of Princeton 
Seminary on the subject of slavery. The first professor in this 
institution was Dr. Archibald Alexander, whose biography, pub 
lished in 1855, was so well and beautifully written by his son, 
that it has ever since been a Presbyterian classic. Its only 
reference to slavery occurs on pp. 425-6, (condensed edition) 
where is given Dr. Alexander's letter to Rev. Wm. S. Plummer, 
written in 1830. The letter of enquiry is not given, but Dr. A's 
answer says : * * "The subject on which you ask advice is both 
delicate and difficult. * * If you wish for my opinion as to 
how you may best promote the welfare of those whom Provi- 
dence has committed to your care, and for whom you must give 
an account, I would say, that you can best promote their happi- 
ness 6y keeping them in your possession, and instructing them 
in the Christian religion''. So here in 1830, in reply to a question 
as to duty, by a minister, who, evidently, was excusably involved, 
concerned and conscience-stricken. Dr. Archibald Alexander ad- 
vises against manumission, and gives no hint of any duty in that 
direction. 

Among the Elders in the church at Oxford, O. was Benj. C. 
Swan, whose name often appears signed to calls for anti-slavery 
movements thereabouts. His son is the Rev. Dr. B. C Swan, 
who married the daughter of Prof. Jared M. Stone, and who now 
lives at Metropolis, Illinois: his cousin was Rev. Geo. W. Swan, 
who was born and raised in Tennessee, graduated at Miami 
University in 1839, completed his three years course at Prince- 
ton in 1842, and died, I think, when chaplain in the navy. These 
men were friends of my father's early anti-slavery days; and 
the elder Mr. Swan handed him the following letter, which I find 
preserved upon his files. 
My dear Cousin: Princeton Seminary. Jany. 12. 18.S0. 

"I am well pleased with the Seminary and with all the Professors 
here; have never been so far off from any of my friends before, but I 
am as kindly treated by the students and Professors as any here. Dr. 
Alexander is truly a great man. He has more strength of intellect than 
any man I ever saw in my life. I have never been with a man whose turn 
of mind pleased me so well. He says nothing which he has not the strong- 
est arguments to substantiate. I am. in a word, pleased with all the 
Professors in the Seminary. There is a Theological Society connected with 
it, in which we debate all subjects connected with theology. Our subject 
last night was psalmody. 

Last week, those students who are appointed to present ques^tions to 
the Society, introduced three questions upon slavery, and no others. Dr. 
Miller was in the chair ; he told them that he hoped they would not take 

* Rev. Dr. B. M. Palmer of New Orleans. 

118 



either of them, for they were not the right kind for the Society. The stu- 
dents were all of the same opinion, with the exception of two or three. 
You may therefore guess what became of the questions. Abolitionism does 
not even breathe here, let alone flourish. Two or three weeks since we had 
up the following question. Ought preachers to preach against those 
things which are supported by the government, though they be sinful and 
contrary to the Bible? Dr. Miller, (for he was in the chair,) decided that 
they should preach against/ them, but with caution. Those students who 
offered the questions upon slavery thought that they had the Doctor fast : 
they then asked him what they should do in reference to slavery ; should 
they not preach against it? I thought that the Doctor was in a difficulty 
myself, but he got out of the difficulty very easily ; and I suppose that 
you will be surprised when I tell you how he got out of it. He said that 
the principle of slavery was not contrary to the Bible, and therefore they 
should not preach against it. if they were to go to the South. This was 
very unsatisfactory to me. There is no proposition more self-evident to 
me than that one man shall not have the labor of another for nothing". 

Your friend and cousin. 

George W. Swan. 

Dr. Charles Hodge took pleasure in claiming^ to be a Repub- 
lican in politics; he voted for Fremont in ISoO and each time for 
Lincoln in the two following;, successive presidential elections. 
He disliked and distrusted Lincoln, and all his great steps to- 
wards Emancipation. Such a man he was. Perhaps the most 
critical and decisive point in the great career of the Great 
Liberator, was when he took the resolution not to admit the 
seceding States back irith slavery ; and upon him, for this, Charles 
Hodge joined in the hue and cry. But in 1865, the position and 
influence of Dr. Hodge was not what it had been in the twenty- 
four years following 1836, and the country cared little then, and 
probably cares less now, what his opinion might be of Abraham 
Lincoln. The battle of freedom had been fought and nearly won 
despite him ; and there is a satisfaction, rather than otherwise, in 
seeing victory come along with his final protest. — A. A, T. 

Note. It is well, perhaps, to cite a high lay authority for 
the biblical sanction of slavery. Here is one: 

"To maintain that slavery is in itself sinful, in the face of all that 
is written in the Bible on the subject, with so many sanctions of the rela- 
tion by the Deity itself, does seem to me to be little short of blasphemous". 
Alexander H. Stephens — "The War Between the States", vol. 2, p. 83. 
(1867). 

"The abolitionists provoked a sudden revulsion of feeling in the 
South, and brought about a state of opinion which aimed to maintain 
slavery by texts of Scripture, by the teachings of Christ and his Apostles." 
— Geo. Ticknor Curtis, p. 277 vol. 2, "Life of James Buchanan." 

FROM THOMAS O. LOWE. ESQ. 

Anti-slavery sentiments give him pain. Thinks Dr. Thom,as' 
views and record on the subject '^ unpatriotic in the extreme". 

Dayton, O., 22 Oct.. 1861. 
I have no idea that the knowledge of the fact that several of your 
congregation differ widely with you in your views of slavery will induce 
you to modify your sentiments or your expressions upon this "vexed ques- 

119 



tion." But I cannot in justice to myself permit you to remain longer in 
ignorance of the fact that whenever you preach abolitionism you give me 
the greatest pain. 

I freely accord you the right to entertain and express your opinions 
on this subject (and on all others), but at the same time I consider them 
unpatriotic in the extreme. 

FROM REV. .JOHN CROZIER. 

An old Student under Dr. MacM aster proposes to ask the Assem- 
hJy to replace him in his old chair. 

Olney, 111., Nov. 22, 1861. 
My dear Brother: 

I see that Dr. Rice has accepted the call to New York. Brother John- 
son of Peoria wrote me yesterday in anticipation of the acceptance, and 
the consequent vacancy of the Chair of Theology in the Northwest Semi- 
nary, and asks, "Would it be possible to have Dr. MacMaster elected to 
fill it?" What do you think of the measure? Does not every question ; 
every consideration of private and public justice and right involved in the 
case,' demand that something be now done? In this day of humiliation and 
rebuke, ought not the friends of truth to call for a re-affirmation of old 
testimonies? and demand that those brethren who have been cast down 
because of their unwavering adherence to principle should be restored to 
places whence they have been driven out? I think the friends of Rice 
and McCormick, who have three Professors, will feel willing for the sake 
of peace and harmony, to have the old friends and the Alumni represented 
by the former Professor of Theology. Would it not be well for the Alumni 
to join in a memorial to the Assembly? 

I have another son ; * * * * John MacMaster. Don't you think I 
have some moral courage to call a boy after an outcast? 

FROM REV. E. D. MACMASTER, D. D. 

Proposes to edit a monthly publication. 

Monticello, Ind., Aug. 20. 1862. 

My dear Brother : 

An attack of inflammatory rheumatism, which has confined me to bed 
nearly the whole of July and a large part of the present month, and from 
which I am yet only partially rec-overed, has prevented an earlier acknowl- 
edgement of your favor of the 30th ult. 

I felicitate you upon enjoyment of the green hills and pure air, and 
free thoughts of the Old Bay State. As to the heterodox theologies, and 
the petit ecclesiastical democracies of these Yankees, taceo. I hope you 
will come back from your visit to that brave old commonwealth replen- 
ished with health, and spirit, and life. 

As for me. I am yet in Hoosierdom, and have my particular habitat in 
a nest infested with more than a usual share of these secessionists mis- 
creants of the North. 

Woe's me that I in Meshech am 

A sojouner so long; 

That I in tabernacles dwell 

To Kedar that belong. 
I hope to close up mv farming operations for the season, and get away 
by the middle of October. When I tell you that I live thirty miles from 
my farm, and have seen it but once since the first of November, you will 

120 



judge how much I am enamored with the Georgies practical or poetical. 

I give you hearty thanks for your list of subscribers to the projected 
monthly ; and not less for your exposition of the Golden Candlestick and 
the Olive Trees. The latter I have not sent for. thinking it best it should 
remain in your own hands till it is more certain that I shall want it. The 
returns of subscribers' names received, are, on the whole, encouraging, 
ranging from sixty down to five, three, two, one. to each church ; in all 
between 500 and 600 ; but they are not full enough to be decisive of the 
final result. From many to whom the prospectus was sent I will receive 
no returns ; but there are many places not yet heard from, as Columbus. 
Springfield, Xenia, Urbana, West Liberty, Sidney, Indianapolis, Madison, 
Evansville, etc.. from which responses more or less favorable may be ex- 
pected. At the low price of one dollar we jnust have not less than 1200 
subscribers to pay the expenses of publication and leave any balance tor 
delinquencies and other contingencies. Whether so many will be obtained 
remains to be seen. 

The course of public events furnishes food for reflection. The alleged 
purpose of Mr. Lincoln no longer to nurse slavery and coax the rebel slav- 
ocracy gives new hope to loyal men. Is it not amazing that over this 
black system of inquity, about which a few years ago we had our little 
conflicts, the whole counti"y has been for a year and a half convulsed by a 
civil war ; and that in three months two millions of armed men will be 
face to face in deadly strife over it in which it is to perish? Great and 
marvellous are thy works. Lord God Almighty ! just and true are thy 
ways, thou King of^ saints ! 

Present my salutations to Mrs. Thomas. 

Yours truly and fraternally, 

E. D. MacMaster. 



121 



VI 

FROM HIS SISTER. 

Stress of war times in Indiana: sons in the army. "Unless we 
proclaim liberty to the captives, our first-born must die". 

Hanover, Ind., 15 Sep. 1862. 
My dear Brother: 

You say in your letter to mother, you have written to me : I 
am glad you have, though it never came, for I had nearly given 
up hope of more letters from you. You have no idea of the utter 
void in my house. My husband is in the midst of reliels at Cum- 
berland Gap, now cut off from all communication by mail. He 
always wrote cheerfully as long as he wrote, but the last came 
many weeks since. My son Thomas, a lieutetiant in the cavalry, 
is lying ill of typhoid fever at St. Louis, where our youngest boy 
is now nursing him. My son, Samuel, an officer of the Third 
Ind. Cav. : the paper to-day says thirty of his regiment were 
killed or wounded in an action in the army of the Potomac. My 
daughter's husband, Wm. Coulter, enlisted in Illinois, and 
brought his wife and littW daughter here. Near Hanover College 
is a camp and battery, for they fear the rebels will cross the 
river. My confidence is in God alone; yet we deserve His wrath 
and cannot complain if He visit us with distress on distress. I 
feel as if we were all implicated in the guilt of slavery, and must 
be punished. What has our church done but connive at this 
sin? Some twenty years ago, we were aroused a little and be 
stirred ourselves; but finding all asleep around us, we were afraid 
to agitate for fear we would waken somebody, and so fell asleep 
ourselves. But God's vengeance slumbereth not; and I Ijelieve, 
unless we proclaim liberty to the captives, our firstborn must 
die. How long has He seen parents and children, brothers and 
sisters, separated and torn from each other, and no man regarded 
it? Now, in a terrible manner. He is bringing us to ''remember 
those who are bound as bound with them." I am perplexed and 
distressed. I know ''the name of the Lord is a strong tower, the 
righteous runneth into it and are safe." But where are the 
righteous? Surely not in these border States. Is there nothing 
we can do? Cannot our church, at least, take a bolder stand? 
I wish I had your opinion on this question. 

Give my love to all your dear family, and believe me, as ever, 

Mary T. Gilpin. 

122 



FROM HIS MOTHER. 

Fears some slaveholder may get into her church communion, by 
guile. Wants to subscribe to Dr. MacMaster's vmgazine. 

Hanover, Ind., Sept. 15th, 18()2. 
My dear Son : 

It gave me great pleasure to hear of your welfare; and of 
your journey. You needed relaxation ; and I rejoice that you are 
with a people who are so considerate : I trust your life may be 
spared to reward them in spirituals for their temporals. Give 
my best love to all I know and thank them for me, for their care 
of you. You mention a letter not received, but to make amends, 
Mary will enclose one with mine. 

Yesterday we had the privilege of sitting around the table of 
the Lord, and I trust He was with us. Dr. Scott and an old min- 
ister of this neighborhood presided at the table. The Dr. j)reach- 
ed a very able and faithful discourse from Eph. 1 : 7. 

A day or two before the meeting, we found out there was a 
slaveholding family, come into your old house, from Kentucky ; 
bringing an old slave with them, which by the bye. we heard they 
had tried to exchange or trade away, while on their route, for one 
younger: likewise that they had sold part of their slaves just be- 
fore they came, and have others in reserve to sell. Your sister 
and myself felt disposed to withdraw from the communion, but 
had no opportunity of conversing with our ruler. Dr. Scott is 
very friendly; often visits us; but had gone to Indianapolis to 
fetch his wife. As usual, an invitation was given to communi- 
cants in good standing in sister churches : they communed : we 
likewise. We want your opinion on the subject. It is said he is 
a Union man ; has a son in the Federal army : but we think we 
have as good a right to refuse church fellowship with a dealer in 
flesh and blood, as you had to refuse your pulpit to a suspected 
traitor, of which Dr. Scott gives us informa^^ion. We shall talk 
with him about it when we have an opportunity. 

Last Thursday night, we were aroused by a man crying the 
Rebels were crossing the Ohio, 1000 of them at Hanover landing. 
This you may be sure alarmed us : we gathered up some of our 
warm clothing and prepared for distress; but the Lord in his 
mercy relieved us by daylight, for the report proved unfounded. 
There were 1000 on the Kentucky side, but none attempted to 
cross but two or three spies who are in Madison jail. This 
aroused the neighborhood : our re-enforcements have come in, 
partly quartered upon the houses, all, all glad to take them. It 
is well the country responds so promptly to a call. Amidst all the 
confusion I think I can say my mind has been calm. The Lord 
is the actual ruler of nations, and I believe will overrule all for 
His own glory. 

123 



I wrote to Mrs. Esp. TarT, after lier husband's death, and 
received kind reply. How does Dr. Mat-Master's magazine suc- 
ceed? Will you give him my name? Give my love to your Al- 
fred — I admire his spirit. Ever your 

MOTHER. 



FROM HIS MOTHEH. 

In tress of war. ''The Christian nation should he roused to im- 
portunate prayer for help." Meanwhile she helps feed sol- 
diers and knits socks for the army. 

Hanover, Ind., Oct. 13, 1862. 
My very dear Son : 

I received your package to-day, with your affectionate letter, 
which I answer at once. 

In this time of need, I trust the Lord's people will send up 
volleys of incense from the altar which will produce powerful 
effects. Our Christian nation should be roused to earnest, im- 
portunate prayer for help. And He who carried His chosen 
people through the Red Sea, and swallowed up their enemies, can 
He not now destroy oppression and deliver the oppressed ? T be- 
lieve He is doing it, in His own way, for His own Glory. T 
should love to be in some of the praying assemblies, but find sub- 
mission is my duty I Pray for me that the Lord would give me a 
thankful heart for all His gracious favors : it is true I am confined 
to the house, but abound in comforts. I am thankful for a quiet, 
peaceful home here. The religious privileges are very great. Drs. 
Wood and Jno W. Scott are faithful men : sixty students in the 
College; large day-school taught by a suitable teacher; very large 
and good Sunday School ; prayer meetings frequent ; female pray- 
er meeting every week, and all well filled with the people general- 
ly attentive. Dr. J. W. Scott, boarding with Dr. Wood in Prof. 
Stone's house, often inquires after and longs to see you. We en- 
joy their society very much. Tomorrow the Soldiers' Aid Society 
meets here; your sister is making coats and I am knitting socks 
for the Army. Prof. Sturgus' family are left very poor. The 
young man, whose education is not completed, is seeking a school. 
bo you know of one for him? The widow, poor thing! she re- 
minds me of my own family. When I look back to Oct. 9th. 1831, 
— Good is the Lord! He hath performed all His promises!! 
Blessed be His holy name ! ! ! 

Give my love to all your family. I am glad to hear of their 
welfare and well doing. 

With much love and sincere affection, Your 

Mother. 

124 



FROM HIS MOTHER— HER LAST LETTER. 

Failing strength. Wants to he with her son when the end comes. 

My dear Son : Hamilton, O., March 27th, 18G3. 

I have before my eyes this morning a sad scene; just now 
Jesse Corwin's son's body, brought home from Washington, where 
his uncle had procured him a situation as clerk to one of the Cab- 
inets. He fell from a three-story building. Death has been mak- 
ing great inroads in this neighborhood. Old Mr. Ogden, you 
may remember him at Harrison, an Elder in Eaton Church, Geo. 
Dick's father-in-law, was buried here Monday. Old Mr. Reed of 
Hamilton likewise has gone. A letter, just come, says my brother, 
Monds, is numbered with the dead. * * * * 

I am looking forward with pleasure to a permanent residence 
with you. My health and strength are, through great mercy, re- 
turning; still I have not left my room. Will you allow me to 
make some requests with regard to my future station. I am 
coming to an age when even "the grasshopper is a burden," there- 
fore the most retired station is acceptable. As you have so many 
rooms, will you find me one retired from noise and interruption. 
I find both nature and grace demand retirement! and as needle 
work, probably, will be my principal employment, it is desirable 
I should be alone; lest haply, I should make the garment wrong 
side upwards ! for sometimes my brain gets addled. Leaving jok- 
ing aside, I want to feel quite at home. 

Jerome Falconer (home wounded from the army) is reviving 
a little. I would like to hear John Woods preach here next Sab- 
bath. His mother lately told me that he told her some of his 
first serious impressions were made in my school-room, under the 
church,— particularly the Lord's Trayer we at times sung in 
verse, I trust many more will compensate for my many years' 
labor in the school-room, although through much unfaithfulness. 

Pray give my best love to all. Goodbye — my dear son, — may 
Jehovah : bless you, and crown all your efforts to His glory. 

Your affectionate 

Mother. 

FROM CLARK MCDERMONT, M. D., AN ELDER IN HIS CHURCH. 

^'In a tear hospital. Nephews icounded, lie six days without 
help, after Chickamaugua. Time just before Mission Ride. 
Colored nurses in hospital need help from Dai/ton. 

Mv Dear Doctor: Cninberland Hospital, Nashville, Nov. 21, 1863. 

* * * * My ^vife weut to Chatanooga on the 12th inst., to see my 
nephew. William McDermont, who is in a hopeless condition with gun-shot 
fracture of the thigh. He lay on the ground with his wounded brother, for 
six days after the battle of Chickamauga, without food, shelter or attend- 
ance of any kind. They sucked the blades of grass to quench their thirst. 
On the fourth day the eldest brother died. He was but twenty years of 
age. and of much stronger constitution than William ; but mortification at- 

125 



tacked his limb, and ended his suffering. It is painful in the extreme to 
contemplate the condition of those brave brothers lying side by side for 
six days without friend or food, or any protection from the rain and cold. 
The deceased, who was my namesake, was a youth of much promise. He 
had quit the University at Bloomington to accompany two younger brothers 
who enlisted as privates in the 82d Ind., and so great was his solicitude 
for the welfare of his brothers, that when I offered him a place as clerk in 
my office, he declined on the ground that they needed his care and compan- 
ionship. 

My hospital is the largest in the Department, and though I am assist- 
ed by sixteen Surgeons, I am kept as busy as a nailer. I enjoy the position 
very much, but could wish for more time to digest what I see, and to 
commune with my friends, many of whom, I presume, imagine I am dead. 
It seems barely possible that my quondam correspondents — Miss Rebecca 
Comley, Lizzie Johnson, Fannie Brown, etc., — would so long deny me the 
pleasure of hearing from them, if they knew that I was alive, and would 
be greatly cheered by a letter from any of them. When one of them shall 
have the charge of sixteen hxmdred wounded Soldiers, I shall write her 
an epistle once a fortnight by way of encouragement. Please say this to 
them for me. 

I feel some curiosity to know what the people north of the Ohio say of 
McCook and Rosecrans' removal from command. It was thought there 
would be great dissatisfaction among the troops ; but it is remarkable how 
soon they became reconciled to it. I meet no one now who does not seem 
to feel that the change was for the best. McCook injured himself by at- 
tributing the order (openly) to the fact that he was not a good enough 
abolitionist, and saying other things disrespectful of the administration. 
Rosey is still admired, but there is a feeling that his luck had turned. 
The army has been heavily re-enforced, and troops are still arriving from 
the East. A Brigade of New York Cavalry arrived yesterday, and went 
into camp near the city. Sherman got up to Stevenson with his corps last 
week. Rousseau commands from the Cumberland to the Tennessee, and 
will soon have an immense force of mounted men. His Headquarters were 
established here to-day. Dana, the Assistant Secretary of War, is also 
to have his Headquarters at Nashville. Hooker had a sharp engagement 
yesterday ; over 150 prisoners were brought up to-night. 

I have a proposition which I wish to make to the good ladies of Day- 
ron. through you. It is that they present the female contrabands of the 
Hospital under my charge, with new dresses on next Christmas. There 
are about fifty of them in all. They do all the washing for the wounded 
soldiers, and do it well and cheerfully, though miserably paid, owing to a 
misunderstanding of orders on the part of the disbursing officers. Some 
of them have been working for the government for the past seven months 
without receiving a cent of pay. and are almost destitute of clothing. 
Many of them have husbands enlisted in our army : none of them have 
any friends among the white ladies of Tennessee, and I wish them to feel 
that they have friends in Dayton. Will you and Dr. Spees put the needles 
in motion? 

I was glad to hear the result of you late election of church officers. 
I hope the elders elected accepted. Give them the right hand of fellow- 
ship for me. and remember me affectionately to all the dear people of the 
dear old church. 

TO HIS SON JOHN AT YALE. 

''Blessed are ye that hunger noid". 

My dear Son : Dayton, O., 26 Dec. 1864. 

Could you get your overcoat? Your sister sent some money 
to you, claiming she owed you some. We find much difficulty in 

126 



getting the funds to supply the expenses of two sons both at 
college; but do not hesitate to write me just how you are situated, 
financially, at any time. I do not wish you to be unnecessarily 
straightened ; though you cannot have the ample means of some 
of your acquaintances. You may see, by and by, that "a man's 
life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he pos- 
sesseth." (Lu. 12:15). ''Blessed are ye that hunger now" (Lu. 
6:21). I remember well the delight with which I once read, in 
my student days at Oxford, the lofty and precious word of Jesus, 
in Matt. 6 : 19-34, especially the latter part. More than the third 
of a century has passed since, having buried my beloved father, 
my best earthly friend, I was struggling through the remaining 
three years of my college course, on very scanty means indeed, — ■ 
not one hundred dollars a year; when my Heavenly Father, in 
those words of his beloved Son, brought to my heart the assur- 
ance that He would provide for me. Blessed be His name ! He 
has abundantly exceeded all my hopes ; and I can confidently 
commit you, and my other dear ones to His gracious protection 
and care. 

* * * * Mrs. Galloway's son has returned home from South- 
ern imprisonment since the Chicamauga fight. He looks well. 
He saw Capt. Franklin Spencer well, the week before he left 
Columbia, S. C. 

TO HIS SON. 
From the Assembly, at St. Louis. 

St. Louis, Mo., 18 May, 1866. 
My dear Alfred : 

You will not forget to use all possible economy in the expenditure of 
money. I could not have procured a suitable outfit and defrayed expenses 
here, but for the liberality of Mr. T. A. Phillips, (very unexpected, though 
very characteristic). 

I have declined the offer of the Presidency of Miami University, which 
was tendered me by leading members of the Board of Trustees ; partly be- 
cause the salary would not support my family, and partly because the 
family are much attached to Dayton. 

FROM REV. W. C. ANDERSON, D. D., FORMERLY PRESIDENT OP 
MIAMI UNIVERSITY. 

At the Asserribly at S.t Louis. 

Cincinnati, 24 May, 1866. 

We hold you. i. e., this Genera] Assembly, responsible for the peace, 
progress, character, and general future of the old Presbyterian Church. 
You have begun nobly ; all praise and honor to the stand taken, in relation 
to the Louisville Rebels. Many thanks for your speech. 

Brother Thomas, treason is right, or it is wrong; the shedding of the 
life's blood of three hundred thousand of our brothers is right, or it is 
wrong. The advocates of this great fact are in harmony with the mind of 

127 



Jehovah, or they are not. They ought, under the rules of Jehovah's house, 
to repent, or they ought not. I have Boardman's speech, in the St. Louis 
Democrat ; and never read a more assailable efifusion. How I would like 
to take him on his assumed positions and false analogies. 

Now, Brother Thomas E. Thomas, we are looking to you, who have 
done so well on the preliminaiy fight, to maintain the great principle of the 
last five Assemblies, and give us the argument, the appeal and all probable 
and possible sequences. Stand straight up to the last five Assemblies. Let 
all the Southern sympathizers go. Then urge on union with the New 
School Presbyterians. Don't be alarmed by the secession of the old Phil- 
adelphia-Princeton clique of pro-slavery men. Let them go : they have 
been the deep curse of the Old School church since 1845. A union with our 
New School brethren, now in perfect sympathy with us. will give us the 
grandest organization, especially if we can clear of the Hodge-Vandyke- 
Boardman school of Presbyterians. God bless you. Finish up the work 
that we may have peace in the future. 

Note. . . Rev. Wm. C. Anderson, D. D., was born in Washing 
ton Co., Pa., in 1804; was o:raduated at Washington College in 
1824. In 1829 he preached as a missionary at the Forks of the 
Yadkin in the mountains of North Carolina: he then became 
agent of the General Assembly Board of Missions, and visited the 
Presbj^teries in Tennessee, Alabama and Mississippi : he settled, 
as pastor, in New Albany in 1839, and then travelled in Central 
America. In 1843 he became Professor of Rhetoric in Hanover 
College; and two years later became pastor of the First Presby- 
terian Church in Dayton, O. He then went to Europe, and while 
abroad was elected President of Miami University, which work 
he began in the fall of 1849, and resigned in 1854. He then be 
came pastor at Chillicothe, and removed thence to a pastorate 
in San Francisco, which he resigned in 1803. He died in August 
1870 and was buried at Junction City, Kansas. 

Dr. Anderson was a man of tact, fine personal presence and 
most genial companionship. He was successful, but not persist- 
ent, in all he undertook. Without controversy or contention, he 
was a consistent anti-slavery man ; and, perhaps more than any 
other, instrumental in the adoption of the ''Spring Resolutions" 
by the General Assembly, at Philadelphia, in 1861.— A. A. T. 

TO REV. E. D. MACMASTER. D. D. 

Dr. MacMaster is replaced in his old chair at the Seminary. 
''The mills of the gods grind slowly," &c. 

Dayton, Ohio, 11 June, 186G. 
Reverend and Honored Sir. 
The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States 
of America, during its recent sessions at St. Louis, Mo., entrusted to us, 
as a committee, the pleasing duty of informing you. that, by an almost 
unanimous vote, you have been elected Professor of Didactic and Polemic 
Theology, in the Theological Seminary of the Northwest, at Chicago. 

In making this appointment the Assembly were persuaded that they 
were rendering the highest service in their power to the cause of theolog- 

128 



leal education ia our country. They felt, too, remembering your former 
labors in this western field, especially in this department of Christian 
work, that they were permitted, through the singular favor of divine 
providence, to perform an act of signal justice, not so much to yourself, as 
to the Church at large, that, through an influence now forever terminated, 
has been so long deprived of your service in a department which you are 
pre-eminently qualified to adorn. 

The Assembly trusts that you will accept the call of the Church. 
The salary attached to the Professorship is three thousand dollars a 
year. 

With sentiments of sincere respect, and with Christian affection, we 
remain Yours, etc. 

Thomas Ebenezeb Thomas. 
R. G. Thompson, of Chicago. 
JNO. C. Gbieb, of Peoria. 

Committee 

TO REV. E. D. MACMASTER, D. D. 

Dayton, O., June 12, 1866. 
My dear Brother : 

I have just discharged an oflScial duty which should have 
been performed a week ago ; that of communicating to you a for- 
mal notification of your election as Professor of Didactic and 
Polemic Theology in the Seminary of the Northwest at Chicago. 
Allow me now to unbosom myself, in a more familiar style, upon 
the occurrence of events which delighted the hearts of thou- 
sands. * * * * 

Your election was another of the measures which fixed the 
character of the Assembly of 1866. Providence had singularly 
prepared the way for us. * * * * 

Such was the composition of the Assembly, and such the 
change of public sentiment in these last years, that the sugges- 
tion of your name met very general approval. Mr. McCormick 
was soon aware that you would be chosen by a very large major- 
ity. Such was his displeasure at the proposed nomination of Dr. 
Lord, that he seemed disposed to accept Dr. MacMaster as a 
compromise. He was" informed, however, very plainly, by such 
Elders as Williams of Ft. Wayne and Francis of Pennsylvania, 
(old friends), that he must not expect to be consulted by the As- 
sembly as to the election of our theological teachers. Still, it 
was agreeable to your friends to find that, in the circumstances 
of the case, he found himself precluded from opposition to you. 

When the election came on, Dr. Rice, (who had been nomi- 
nated by the elder of his own church, Mr. Day ; — and it was said 
that the church would back the nomination with a gift of $20,- 
000.), telegraphed his withdrawal. He had not the ghost of a 
chance. Dr. Lord did the same, for the same reason; perhaps 
other reasons. You received over 200 votes. 

It was an old Greek saying, as you remember, that ^^the mills 
of the gods grind slowly, hut they grind exceeding small". Divine 

129 



providence has hastened the revolutions of these last days. Who 
conld have foreseen seven years ago so rapid a change of situation 
as that which the North and the South now present? You pre- 
dicted the issue, indeed as many of us anticipated it; but when 
you promised to meet Thornwell and Palmer at Philippi, I think 
you scarcely looked for so early and so radical a revolution of 
public sentiment as that we now witness. 

You will be aided at Chicago by a valuable body of co-labor- 
ers, in Drs. Halsey, Lord and Elliott. Your presence; will draw 
around the Seminary the sympathy and aid of the Northwest, and 
of Indiana and Ohio, as nothing else could. I have no question 
that the number of students, already encouraging, will be greatly 
increased, and the rapidly gi'owing wealth of this region will 
supply what is needful toward endowment. 

I think 1 need not add further considerations. The eastern 
brethren, except a few ultra-conservatives, who are fast finding 
their level, are heartily for you. The church feels that it owes 
you reparation for a long course of injustice; and, much more, 
that it owes to the truth, and to the cause of sound christian edu- 
cation, your restoration to that department of labor for which 
you are so peculiarly qualified. 

Ever truly yours, T. E. Thomas. 

FROM REV. E. D. MACMASTER, D. D. 

My dear Sir: Poland. Ohio. July 10, 1866. 

I send herewith to you a letter addressed to the committee of the 
General Assembly of which you are chairman, signifying my acceptance of 
the appointment to the Theological Seminary at Chicago. As a matter of 
taste and propriety, in ordinary circumstances, I should prefer a short note, 
simply declaring my acceptance. But it is to be remembered that there 
has been over the affair of this Seminary a huge war. extending through 
more years than our great civil war. though the war itself was not of quite 
as great proportions ; and that sharp and heavy blows were dealt and 
wounds inflicted which are not yet healed. With those who are now the 
defeated party it is a question of how they are to be regarded and treated 
under the new order of things. My view is that the truth which has so 
long been the suflfering truth, has paramount rights : among other things, 
the right to assert itself to be the truth and to have always been the truth. 
On the other hand, if those who in other years acted so badly are disposed 
now to act rightly, they are not to be repelled, but conciliated ; and least 
of all are petty revenges to be taken against them. Briefly to indicate this 
as my own view, and. so far as I may be regarded as made by the late ap- 
pointment to the Seminary the representative of those with whom I have 
heretofore acted, as their view also, is the objec-t of my letter. It seems 
to be desirable that this should be understood by all concerned, a! the out- 
set of my connection anew with the Seminary. 

I have found more difficulty in coming to a conclusion on the question 
of returning to this service than you may think. The state of my mind is 
exactly expressed when I say that "I do not see that under all the condi- 
tions of the question I am at liberty to decline this appointment, and there- 
fore I accept it." How unfit I feel myself for such a work. He only knows 
to whom all things are known. Let me, my dear brother, have the help 
of your prayers. 

130 



FROM REV. E. D. MACMASTER, D. D., HIS LAST LETTER. 

Hopes and plans for the Seminary at Chicago. 

Poland. Ohio, Aug. 28, 1866. 
My dear Brother : 

Your favor of the 7 inst., came duly to hand and was most acceptable, 
as your letters always are. 

You say your people gave for the endowment of the Theological Semi- 
nary less than you hoped, and you seem to think, less than they ought. 
I have never thought what they, or any other people or person, were likely 
to give. But if I had thought of it at all, I should not have expected a 
larger sum than that you name. I have often thought that the feeling of 
reluctation to part with money, of men with whom it has been a large part 
of the business of their lives to make money, is probably not duly appreci- 
ated by persons who. like you and myself, have never made this any part 
of our' business, and to whom the obtaining of what was required for nec- 
essary uses came as a mere incident of other employments, and almost 
without a thought about it. except when, as has sometimes happened to me. 
there chanced to be a deficit of it to meet present wants. However this 
may be. the Seminary is under obligation to your good people for their 
contribution : and, as the present contributions are spoken of in connection 
with the endowment of the chair I am called to occupy, though I expect 
my usufructuary interest in it not to be of very long duration. I ought to 
feel a special obligation, which I am not indisposed to acknowledge. The 
Seminary wants $150,000 to endow fifty scholarships: and $50,000 for 
other uses, a Library fund, a Contingent fund. etc. The high cost of living 
at Chicago necessitates some provision to reduce the expense to students. 
It will not do to depend for this on annual collections. This would involve 
the expense of agency, and the churches would become weary of annual 
solicitations. Hence the need of permanent funds for these objects. 

But we much more need an increased activity in the appropriate 
agency for finding a larger number of candidates for the ministry, not a 
crowd indiscriminately gathered, the good, the bad, and indifferent, but 
such as are called of God to do this work, and for taking care of their 
culture and training every way, in learning and in the divine life, before 
they go to the Theological Seminary and while in it. This. I think, is 
now our greatest want. Will you turn your thoughts to it? 

I leave this place for Chicago to-morrow, (29th). via Pittsburgh and 
Ft. Wayne, and hope to reach my destination on Monday, the 3d of Sep- 
tember. Somehow I do not go with a very bouyant spirit. My temperament 
has always disposed me to cleave to old friends rather than to seek new 
ones: and this, as you will suppose, is not less so now than thirty years 
ago. I should go with much more satisfaction, if you were going also. 
Indeed. I feel in this respect a dissatisfaction. You. as well as I, were 
proscribed seven vears ago, and for the same cause : and it is due to you 
and the church and the truth, that you should be recalled to the service 
from which you were then relieved. I have this much at heart. I know 
not what may be found practicable immediately. Of course I can do noth- 
ing inconsistent with the relations into which I am put with the professors 
now in the Seminar>\ But.— but.— but. we must think of this matter. We 
ought to have a fifth Professor. Cannot we move for this soon? 

Give my best regards to Mrs. T. and all .vour house, especially my 
friend, John. Yours most truly, 

E. D. MacMasteb. 

131 



The McCortnick Seminary at Chicago. Sketch of its history and 
hope. Remarkable character of Cyrus H. McCormick. No 
Political sense, — hut he cheapened the bread of the wo-rld. 
"All the keys hang not at one man's girdle." 

Note. "The McCormiek Theological Seminary" at Chicago. 
The course which Dr. Thomas said Dr. Nathan L. Rice "must be 
permitted to run at Chicago" lasted just eighteen months, when 
he left this Seminary, never to return. If the times singularly 
favored him in 1859, a Nemesis, in subsequent events, was quickly 
upon him; for 1861 was a bad time to establish a pro-slavery out- 
post, so far removed from support, and in the distant Northwest. 

While Dr. Rice departed, the Seminary remained: and a 
few words about this institution, destined, probably, to be the 
first in influence in the Presbyterian Church, will not be out of 
place. In the best biography of Mr. Cyrus H. McCormick, the 
statement is made that "he founded the Theological Seminary of 
the Northwest". He funded it, but he did not found it. This 
correspondence shows who nursed and tended its infancy and 
prevented its extinction, or transfer to Danville, where it would 
have gone into practical or ultimate extinction. Of course, every- 
body ought to come to Chicago if he can, but to see this in 1857 
required more foresight than to recognize the fact in 1802. The 
Seminary might have had an unexampled prosperity had the 
plans of Drs. Thomas and MacMaster been carried out and the 
land then offered it,— situate in Hyde Park,— been accepted. 
That land is now worth several million dollars: Dr. Grey, Editor 
of "The Interior," lately stated, that if this property had been 
taken and held, the Seminary would have been the wealth4est 
educational institution in the United States. 

No one, not even Dr. L. J. Halsey, who has written a yet 
unpublished history of this Seminary, has any wish to narrate the 
contentions which followed Dr. Rice's removal to New York; so 
bitter did they become, that the General Assembly of the Presby 
terian Church released Mr. McCormick from the latter half of his 
original bond of donation, which was never paid. But, in 1871, 
Dr. Halsey says, Mr. McCormick became reconciled to the Sem- 
inary; his lilierality was renewed and repeated, until, with the 
approval of all parties, the General Assembly of the Church de- 
creed that the institution should forever bear the name of this 
remarkable man. 

Cvrus Hall McCormick, of Scotch-Irish descent, was born 
in 1809, in Rockbridge County, Va. In 1816, his father contrived 
a machine which could cut standing grain. His son followed the 
line of his father's old investigations, and found a solution of his 
problem in an invention that gave a lateral as well as a forward 
motion furnished by the horses; and, after long difficulty, prac- 
tical success came when he gave the lateral motion by means of a 

132 



crank to a staight cutting blade placed at right angles to the 
line of draft of the machine. This was in 1831. In 1839, his 
Reaper began to go into general use. In 1845, he removed to Cin- 
cinnati ; here he met Dr. Nathan L. Rice, prominent and active 
in fighting the pro-slavery conflict in the Presbyterian Church, of 
which Mr. McCormick was already a member. In 1847, he remov- 
ed to Chicago, where, two years later, his brothers, Wm. !r<., and 
Leander J., joined him. With their efficient help he quickly 
founded a great fortune at Chicago, at a time when fortunes there 
were neither numerous nor great. With great success there came, 
as there always come in such cases, men eager to seize upon and 
dispute the right to his inventions. The latter were indisputable, 
although they were imperfectly protected by patents. In the 
litigation and printed controversies that ensued, Mr. McCormick 
discovered an ability, persistence and sagacity which was recog- 
nized throughout the business world of Europe as well as of 
America. With the growth of his strength and fortune, the poli- 
tics, which was then only the slavery controversy, of this country, 
greatly interested him. ' He was a staunch, perhaps the best and 
most liberal friend of Stephen A. Douglass; in his interest he 
went to the Democratic Convention at Baltimore in 1800, and he 
followed his fortunes up to the day when Senator Douglass an- 
nounced to the people of Illionois that ''the quickest road to peace 
was stupendous preparation for war". Thereafter, of all men 
who were purely business men, Cyrus H. McCormick was perhaps, 
for a time, the most dangerous in the United States. In 1864, 
during the McClellan canvass, he was candidate for Congress, in 
Chicago, and was defeated by the general patriotic uprising there. 
He proposed that the democratic party, by convention, should 
select a "commission" to meet a similar delegation from the south, 
to end the war and restore the Union. Who can exaggerate the 
cost to humanity on this continent of the success of such a 
scheme ! It was only refrained from by the certainty of the arrest 
and imprisonment of any attempting to carry it out. Mr. McCor- 
mick was no Secessionist or disunionist ; yet there was no length 
he would not go, to save his beloved institution of slavery. But, 
after all, we must not blame him too severely. He was no worse 
than thousands of good men of his day, of like opinions. He had 
not fomented rebellion or secession ; he was not a politician or a 
statesman. The fact is, with almost every other merit, he had 
no political sense. He said, "The two strongest hoops which held 
the Union together were the Democratic Party and the Old 
School Presbyterian Church." Strong hoops they, when the 
strain came! 

How true it is that "all the keys hang not to one man's gir- 
dle" ! The portrait of McCormick hangs in the hall of the insti- 
tution he endowed, and no one can help liking that face. His 
memorv is held high in honor among citizens of this community 

133 



whose opinion is most worth asking. He was, indeed, one of the 
great captains of industry. His invention, developed by himself 
and others, directly, and by countless indirect ways, enriched the 
whole Northwest. More than this I place to his honor ; for he 
probably did more than any other one man who ever lived to 
cheapen the bread of the world. — A. A. T. 



TO HIS DAUGHTER— MRS. EDWIN A. PARROTT. 

On his son's graduation at Dartmouth College. Things liked, 
and disliked. 

Mr. Jabez Fisher's, Washington, N. H.. 2,3 July, 1807. 

My dear Mary May : 

Your mother and I reached Hanover, as you may have heard from the 
children, by Saturday noon. Alfred met us at the cars, and took us direct- 
ly to Dr. Noyes. The Professor, wife, and daughter, constitute the family ; 
though the younger son and wife were home on a visit. We could not 
have fallen on a pleasanter home for a few days. Dr. Noyes has been the 
theological Professor at Dartmouth for seventeen years. He is one year 
older than I am ; a quiet, thoughtful, scholarly man, with a pleasant humor 
running through his lighter conversation. We had many delightful talks, 
reminding me of my long conversations with Dr. MacMaster at New Al- 
bany. 

The commencement exercises were highly creditable. Monday evening 
was occupied with prize declamation. I was one of those who composed 
the committee to award the prizes. Tuesday was Class-day. as they call it ; 
the exercises being such as are appointed by the graduating class. An 
Oration, and Poem ; with Chronicles and Prophecies relating to the college 
history, and future career of the class, occupied several hours. The Chron- 
icles and Prophecies were flat, and unworthy of the occasion; the wit 
being such as could be appreciated only by the students; and the general 
tone of the pieces rather low. The first two pieces, however, were admir- 
able. Wednesday was devoted to the orations of invited guests. Dr. Quint 
of Newburyport addressed the theological society. I did not hear him ; 
having driven over the mountains for ten or twelve miles that morning, 
and feeling disposed to rest. Theodore Til ton, editor of the New York In- 
dependent, delivered the address to the Societies.. He spoke without notes. 
His style was not superior to many extemiwre efforts I have heard in Ohii> 
— his delivery rather energetic than graceful — and on the whole falling 
below what I had expected. The matter of his discourse was deadly poi- 
son ; shallow, conceited, pretentious, and false. His theme was Mental 
and Moral Self-culture. He began by saying that we had done what the 
Psalmist thought impossible! "We have bound the sweet influences of 
Pleiades;" — quoting the language of the Almighty, (Job 38-31) as the utter- 
ance of the Psalmist. His whole discourse substituted self-culture for 
spiritual renovation. It was a scarcely concealed infidelity, from beginning 
to end : a sad result of Ward Beecher's religious teaching. And this man 
was for years the superintendent of Beecher's sabbath school ! 

Your affectionate father. 
T. E. Thomas. 

134 



TO HIS SON. 

"The General Assembly of 1871. Chicago seen from two points 
of view. 

My dear Alfred : Chicago, 111.. 26 May, 1871. 

I returned yesterday from our Presbyterian Assembly's excursion to 
Lake Forest. Almost all the body went, and friends increased the crowd 
to about two thousand. Over sensitive people may possibly condemn a 
venerable body like a General Assembly for spending a day in such frivol- 
ous employment as excursions and collations and speechmaking ; but who 
ever will sit six hours a day in the Assembly, for a week ; and spend no 
small part of the outside hours in committee work ; besides conducting 
correspondence and holding important interviews with scores of people, 
friends and strangers ; will vote for such a recreation as we enjoyed yester- 
day with a clear conscience, and hearty good will. 

Mr. Mayor Farwell. the merchant prince of Chicago; him.self a Meth- 
odist, but his wife a Presbyterian ; planned the trip, and footed the bills. 
This was Chicago-like. If he desired to show a few special friends his 
house and grounds, it was excusable ; for they have few rivals in the 
West ; and his private library is one of the largest and most valuable in 
the country. You may find an account of the trip under the title of "Edit- 
orial Correspondence" in the next Herald and Presbyter; for my room- 
mate. Dr. Monfort, being prevented from writing, just now, by a boil on 
his right hand. I have consented to supply his lack of service by a letter. 
It was written, however, at 10 p. m.. after our return from the trip, having 
been on our feet most of the time since 9 a. m. 

Chicago will be admired, or execrated, according to the point of view 
from which you regard it. If a colored .Jehu, with a glossy hat and white 
gloves, in a velvet coat and light inexpressibles, drive you in an elegant 
barouche, with a charming Chicago-enne beside you, to point out the ele- 
gant gentleman's seats — it is no matter which noun the adjective qualify 
— and her husband, the happy proprietor of numberless land — and water — 
lots, before you, to indicate the rapid steps of the city's growth by the 
ever appreciating value of the properties you pass ; — if he drive, I say, at 
a dashing pace down Michigan Avenue, and up Wabash, between the long 
lines of massive, marble palaces, adorned with all that wealth can procure ; 
remember, however, that real happiness is an article not to be found in 
any of Chicago's princely shops — for sale, I mean ; — if you roll over the 
Nicholson boulevard pavement, with broad sidewalks on each side, flanked 
by grassy lawns and overhanging trees ; — you will pronounce Chicago, next 
to New York, the most brilliant product of American skill In the art of 
city-building ; and readily crown her the Queen of the Prairies ! 

But if you ride or walk for miles, as we did yesterday, beyond the 
inky, stinking, horrible Styx, which they call "Chicago River" ; through an 
endless series of frame houses, resting in the mud; separated by streets 
of natural earth, cut up even now into deep ruts, and knee-deep in mud ; 
into streets guiltless of sidewalk or shade tree ; the young inhabitants bare- 
foot and barehei^ded. and unkempt and unwashed, and almost undressed, 
crawling like tadpoles in the slime of their native pools ; the older, — every 
woman with a babe on her arms, and every man with a sign of his handi- 
craft ; if you saw cows milked on sidewalks of board, because the street 
was too muddy to be hazarded; if you surveyed the miles on miles of squal- 
or and poverty and wretchedness rolled on a dead level, and prepared by 
such an endless variety of smells that a friend yesterday said the census of 
them should be published among the statistics of Chicago, — you would re- 
port that this famous city is the filthiest stew of human cattle you ever 
had the misfortune to visit ! 

Respect to Judge Jordan. Affectionately your Father, 

Tho. E. Thomas. 

135 



TO REV. JOSEPH G. SYMMES, D. D. 

Failing strength. Thinks the success of the Apostles due to 
immediate training of the Master. 

Middlebury, Vt., 18 Aug. 1874. 

Many thanks for your repeated and pressing invitations. 

I have been troubled witli irregularity of the liver since 
April. Till I came here the downward progress was steady. 
Since I came, that has been arrested, and the tide turned. I am 
told there is no organic disease, nor any reason for a permanent 
disability. It is my expectation that the seaside will complete 
w^hat the mountain air has begun. I hope to return home by the 
middle of September : our Seminary term opens at Lane on Sept. 
9th, but I may conclude to spend the latter part of September at 
Red Sulphur Springs, Va. In that case, I shall pass over the 
New Jersey road on my way to Washington, and nothing would 
delight me more than to meet you once more. I long to talk with 
you over the past, and especially the future. 

The Kingdom of our blessed Lord is assailed on every side, 
and worst of all, from within, and must fight a fierce battle be- 
fore the final victory comes. Come it will, and glorious will be 
the reward of those of you who shall be called of God to bear 
testimony for the truth as it is in Jesus, against a gainsaying 
and godless generation. Not that all generations sinc« the fall 
have not deserved the description; but the Scriptures intimate 
that in the last days, perilous times shall come, (2 Tim. 3:1-9, 
and 2 Thess. 2 : etc.) . Certainly the signs of the times, while dis- 
playing a wider diffusion of the gospel than ever, also exhibit an 
unwonted outbreak of hostility to sound doctrine; of contempt 
for the Word of God; of bold, unblushing infidelity, as well as 
cool, audacious atheism. Well, ''The Lord reigneth : let the 
earth rejoice" ! If "Clouds and darkness are bound about Him", 
we are also sure that "Righteousness and judgment are the hab- 
itation of His throne". 

The Lord raise up and qualify a multitude of faithful men, 
able to teach others, being themselves taught of the Lord ! Was 
not the unparalleled success of the Apostles due to the immediate 
training which they had received from our Divine Master? Oh, 
that He would condescend once more to train His own servants 
for the work of the ministry ! 

Mrs. T. joins me in affectionate remembrance of Mrs. Symmes 
and yourself and family. 

Note. Rev. Joseph G. Symmes grew up on a farm in But- 
ler County, O. ; joined Dr. Thomas's church in Hamilton ; attended 
Farmers' College, and with his mother and brother removed to 
Hanover, Ind., in order to attend the college there. His mother 
died of the visitation of cholera, which carried off Dr. Scovel, the 

136 



President of the institution. Mr. i>ymmes was there in attend- 
ance when Dr. Thomas's Presidency began. He and my father, as 
teacher and pupil, always maintained the warmest friendship. — 
A. A. T. 



TO HIS SON. HIS LAST LETTER. 

Kemper Lane, Walnut Hills, Cin'ti. O., 18 Dec. 1874. 
My dear John : * * * * 

You know, perhaps, that ever since I came home, I have been 
aiding Dr. Smith in reviewing his translation of Spinoza's 
Ethica, the celebrated source of modern pantheism. The Doctor 
reads his version, while I follow the Latin original to correct any 
slips of the eye, or pen; which are wonderfully few, to be sui*e. 
I enjoy the work, for it has given the impulse to review former 
studies in this line; as Cicero says; retuli me * * * * ad ca 
studia, quae, retenta animo, remissa temporitus, longo intervallo 
intermissa, revocavi. (Tusc. Quaest. 1:1.) I began with Spi- 
noza's Summary of Des Cartes, his master; with Kant's Critique 
of Pure Reason; and with Chalybaus History of Speculative 
Philosophy — from Kant to Hegel. These I read pari passu, at 
quiet intervals. * * * 

Our love to all. Affectionately your Father, 

Tho. E. Thomas. 



OBIIT FEBRUARY 2, 1875 



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